Meet: Dr Keith Hammett QSM, VMM

Keith Hammett has dedicated his life to plant breeding. If a Nobel Prize were awarded for this field, Keith would surely have it in the bag!

Dr Keith Hammett QSM, VMM



Dr Keith Hammett QSM, VMM, is one of the world’s most celebrated and successful plant breeders. His Queen’s Service Medal, Gold Veitch Memorial Medal, and several dozen other awards, acknowledge his esteemed status in the international community of respected plant hybridists.



It was inevitable that Keith Hammett would take up gardening, given his heritage. With both grandfathers as professional gardeners in Britain and his father a keen amateur gardener, the passion for gardening was in his blood. Growing up in England, Keith caught the bug as a child, particularly for sweet peas and dahlias.





Sweet pea 'Blueshift'



At the tender age of fourteen, he won a show bench award for his sweet peas, setting him on his career path. The life of a plant breeder is a solitary one, requiring precise technical skills, dedication, passion, and patience. Results can take decades to achieve, making meticulous record-keeping essential. Keith has navigated this challenging field, living on his wits and becoming a celebrated plant breeder.





Dahlia 'Beeline II'



One of Keith’s most famous sweet peas is ‘Chelsea Centenary’, named by the Royal Horticultural Society to celebrate the 100th World Famous Chelsea Flower Show held in London each year. It is a clear blue exhibition-type sweet pea with five or six flowers on each stem. He is globally recognized for creating more than 300 commercially viable ornamental plant cultivars. Although his first love was the sweet pea, Keith is probably better known for the dahlias that bear his name.





Sweet pea 'Erewhon'



Keith loves the grace and simplicity of the common single-flowered dahlias that grow in the wild. Determined to breed a new kind of dahlia with dark foliage, he embarked on a project that took a decade to complete. These open single flowers display their stamens and attract bees, and the plants need few or no stakes.



Keith has weathered the storm and survived irrational biosecurity laws and government ignorance. His reward is the smile on the faces of his customers!





Sweet pea 'Little Red Riding Hood'



When did your interest in gardening and flower growing begin?

From childhood as my parents maintained a good suburban garden in the UK.



What benefit came with your position at Southampton University that enabled your plant breeding?

I used the university’s botanic garden while there to expand my interests in plant breeding.



Did moving to New Zealand in 1967 turbo charge your plant breeding pursuits?

Yes, but specifically six years later when we obtained the 10 acres in West Auckland where I still live and work.



Did sweet peas and dahlias dominate your plant breeding?

They didn’t; it’s just that they are the most visible. Interestingly, though, they represent opposite poles of a breeding continuum. The sweet pea is grown from seed and self-pollinates or is an obligate inbreeder, while the dahlia is grown from cuttings and tubers and cross-pollinates, or is an obligate outbreeder. 



Author’s Note: Keith is globally recognised not only for his prolific award-winning sweet pea and dahlia varieties, his extensive plant breeding successes include amaryllis, arthropodium, carnations, chrysanthemum, clivia, cosmos, , helianthus, lathyrus, mimulus, nemesia, petunia, polyanthus, sandersonia, and zantede​schia.



What have been your favourite plant varietal achievements?

As with children, one should not have favourites. I am proud to have changed Lathyrus odoratus (sweet peas) from a single species that relied on mutation for variation into a hybrid. Namely Lathyrus X hammettii.Similarly, I have incorporated genes from different species of dahlia that had not formed part of the cultivated dahlia gene pool previously.



Any plant breeding objectives yet to be achieved?

Enhanced scent in sweet pea. The yellow of course, but I expect this is sitting in the wings in the UK from my gene pool. The true bizarre carnation is one that has eluded me, and a crimson football clivia.



What is the proudest career moment?

Formally the Gold Veitch Memorial Medal awarded by the RHS in the UK in 2013. However, I take great pleasure from seeing one of my raisings in someone else’s garden, especially if it is in another country.



Do you have any advice to a young person interested in a plant breeding vocation? This is the really hard one. It is equally difficult in New Zealand as in Australia. Only a single university now has a botany department. Horticultural teaching is even worse off. I have had young people who have worked with me, who had a firm foundation in plant breeding when they moved on, but none has found a niche where they can breed plants beyond a hobby level.