If I read this thread correctly, I think CPBobby already plans to give them away.
It appears that while he wanted to try these out, he didn't really want that many tubers, & thus was finding a way to spread the others around, without it costing him.
Anyone who is new & just follows what they see others doing here, might not know it is "bad form" to trade or sell things that they got for free.
There's all different kinds of situations here, where it is difficult to see what is "bad form". For instance, there are people here who push & manipulate to get rare/desirable plants in trade from others, claiming they "really, really want a particular plant. The person with the plant may not want to part with it, but seeing how much the person wants their beloved specimen, they may go along with a trade or such.
Then not more than a month or two later, they see the plant being traded here on TF to someone else! When they ask about it, they are told "oh, the plant isn't growing well", or "Oh, well I found this other plant that I always liked better", or some other excuse. For those of us who value our "babies", this can be seen as "bad form" too.
Indeed there are a lot of ways where "bad form" takes place!
So before we tar & feather CPBobby here, perhaps we should look at his real motives...
He said from the very beginning:
"...I always wanted to grow tuber and the opportunity came about before I can properly prepare for it...." and, "...I don't want to slaughter the lot of them..."
and,
" I will be willing to trade them... no reasonable offer refused...but ...would take a capensis that could dwarf the ones I have, if it came to that."
From this we know that he is 1) concerned for the welfare of the plants themselves; & 2) he isn't trying to get a lot or make a great deal off of these, even though they are worth "$8-$10 per tuber", as was pointed out.
From what I see, he simply hoped to get a little something in return for sharing them.
I also got in on the original give-away & lost, ...and I think that this could be a nice way of getting a second chance to get some tubers.
And again, he's not asking for much in return. In fact, I'd actually rather send him some of my extra plants than to send him money for postage.
Most people want something rare or large in trade for things, and yet here he values even common things in return for these, so he is making it possible for nearly anyone to get some rare tubers! It is obvious to me that he is NOT trying to get rich off of these in any way. Its not like he got these or manipulated someone to trade these to him, in order to sell them on ebay or to get some other rare plants or something. So what is the big deal?
In the past I have tried to share anything I "WON" in a large give-away & to spread around the "winnings"... by having the person doing the giveaway to SPLIT my winnings (if I win) into smaller packages & to give the 2nd & 3rd place "winners" some. (I did that recently with some seed that Butch had in a very generous give-away.)
No one really needs 20 tubers in order to try the plant out, however I would assume shipping out 5 packages to different people would be costly, perhaps more-so from Hawaii or where-ever. And in many give-aways you still have to pay postage.
So if CPBobby charged shipping while giving them away "free", or simply got a person to cover some of his expenses by doing a trade for them, is it really that much different? (Again, he is only wanting a common plant in return!)
I find this whole situation very "ironic", as there are so many other situations of "bad form" worse than this here on TF, that for some reason never get addressed.
In fact, I have been around long enough to remember someone here getting a whole load of VFT's & other really nice plants from someone who was getting out of the hobby... and then turned around & used those plants to trade for other stuff for themselves. This sort of thing goes on all the time. How is this that much worse or different?
Just my opinion...
. I am gonna try to grow like 1-3 of them but if I am not successful I don't want to slaughter the lot of them however; I will be willing to trade them no reasonable offer refused unless I already have a bunch of something but even still I would take a capensis that could dwarf the ones I have if it came to that.
