Yes for more re-purposable terms!
Agrestic - of the fields; rural; unpolished
A proto-landrace that has yet to undergo the adaptation phase… is an agrestex? Denoting not-yet-refined?
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Speaking as nerdy logophile, I think it’s a fun word.
Speaking on behalf of normal people (which I am not), I suspect that word is complicated-looking enough to make “indecipherable jargon!” alarm bells go off in many people’s brains. It’s a little too hard to parse and sound out silently.
My suspicion is that we want terms that normal people will feel comfortable using regularly. “Landrace” is great for that because it’s so easy to read and say. “Grex” is weaker for that, but it has the advantage of being only four letters and one syllable.
I’m thinking we probably want words that are one or two syllables long and very easy to sound out at a glance. That will make it easier for them to stick in normal people’s brains, which is particularly important when we’re going to introduce a whole bunch of new concepts at once to beginners.
What does everyone else think?
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As a rule, I think redefining words and making up words is counter to the effective communication of ideas.
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Knowing language, it would much rather repurpose something that already exists and maybe smoosh it together a bit. I mean, look at the Academie Francaise and the word “computer” or the complete swamping of the original meaning of “old growth” etc. We’re lucky if we don’t end up with these things being called “shoeseeds” colloquially, or something. And getting general folks to use language precisely is never going to happen.
Defining some useful language for ourselves, and being complete and careful when we describe what we have and thus fostering a culture of thoughtful, thorough descriptions does sound appealing, as does asking questions if something sounds unclear.
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(Chuckles.) All excellent points.
One of my favorite linguistic shifts is “computer,” which used to be a person and is now a machine. Likewise “car,” which used to be used in the 1800s for a horse-drawn carriage!
What came to mind as I read through this discussion was that it may help to break things down systematically.
If we think about Joseph’s definition of a landrace, there are three dimensions: genetically diverse, crossed, and locally adapted. Those things are all on a spectrum, but if you think of the two extremes of each that gives you eight combinations to consider. A classic commercial hybrid, for example, is crossed but not genetically diverse, and it may or – more likely – may not happen to be locally adapted to your area. An heirloom is locally adapted to somewhere at some point but not genetically diverse.
What people are trying to pin down here are two other corners of this cube: genetically diverse but neither crossed nor locally adapted (e.g., what a lot of folks start their landrace with by buying lots of different inbred varieties), and the succeeding generations which are increasingly crossed and still genetically diverse but not quite locally adapted yet.
Also, I don’t think we need to necessarily worry about all eight combinations. I’m don’t know if, say, genetically diverse and locally adapted but not crossed is a situation that arises often enough to need a specific term.
(Edit: removed an aside comment that may have just added more confusion.)
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One convenient thing is that Joseph’s definition of landrace is in complete alignment with the academic literature and other uses of that term.
It’s not a concept I was familiar with before encountering it via Landrace Gardening along with Kelly Winterton’s potato onion project, but it is a powerful concept that I am very glad I encountered. I’m very vested in language, and I appreciate when a single term like landrace can be the gateway to a new body of knowledge.
Thankfully I don’t think that the concepts or terminology of grex or hybrid swarm are nearly as fundamental as landrace, where there is this general consensus about meaning.
Whatever y’all decide on, please just keep it simple. It’s better to do nothing than to overcomplicate it in my opinion.
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Agreed. This is an interesting space to explore but we don’t need to solve it this season.
Agreeing on standards for traits based on plant characteristics and seed mix composition based on traits is arguably a more pressing problem. It seems it will very likely need further discussion between now and next seed collection.
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Yes, very wise. 
Being able to encapsulate the essence of something complicated in a simple word or phrase or concept is a valuable skill that fosters communication and teaching.
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Well said, Im just learning how to articulate and speak about the combinations of seed. We already know its described with science, we as a community of gardeners just have to understand each other as our garden spaces grow through the steps of diversity. For years my garden has been mixed up due to lack of space, but a happy garden indeed with fruits every season. No one wanted to trade seeds from me until the GTS group of gardeners started.
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And now you have a community of people who get wildly excited about highly genetically diverse seeds! 
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The folks in Europe were using flock as a synonym for grex.
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Love that folks have started using flock. One of the participants in my crowd breeding project came up with the term and we’ve started using it a lot
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I was so excited when I started reading this discussion, because I was thinking, finally, I’ll understand what these terms, like “grex” actually mean.
(Jessica, I think you should just begin tossing your repurposed words into random discussions, like a word grex, and eventually a landrace language will shake out of it.)
Ok, but seriously, language evolves from common usage, and I admire that you are all being purposeful about your definitions, instead of just letting things happen by chance. Excellent discussion.
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I agree! 
A part of me just wants to call things F1 grex, F2 grex, and maybe even F0 grex if they haven’t been crossed. And then call it a landrace once I lose track of the years…
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That’s what I do. I tend to not use the “f(number)” vocabulary as it’s too technical and more specific to conventionnal breeding where they count years after EACH cross, whereas we, or at least with the allogamous, cross every year. And also this vocabulary seems too technical for the newcomers: you lose some with this f thing which sounds “special”, where it’s in fact simple, kind of basic… So I phrase it like that: “year 1 grex”, “year 2 grex”. Then after that there is this intermediary phase of selection (year 3, 4, 5…) until calling it a landrace, i.e. locally adapted, communtity adapted, etc. So about to year 6 and next.
It’s how we phrased this powerpoint in Antibes. (“An” standing for “year”).
1 A2 X pepscurcurbitacees (1).pdf (850.1 KB)
Just adding one thing: I’ve seen in meetings that people talking about the same selection process get confused with these wordings: “yearX” against “fX”, and that’s kind of logical because the f1s are observable in the field in year 2. So I kind of stand by my simpler wording, always underlying the main structure : grex phase then selection phase then maintenance of the obtained landrace. Without the underlying of the overall structure people don’t get it easily. Whereas when it’s seen they get it.
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I like it. Also F1 will have some negative connotation for people who avoid commercial hybrids in seed catalogs (here seeds are marked as OP vs F1).
Im assuming year 1 grex is the seeds after the first season and not before.
Also if someone gives me his year 3 grex, does it become a year 1 grex after I save seeds? I’m assuming yes given that our focus is on local adaptation.
Anyway, I think it’s fun to talk about this but we will probably still understand each other with the varied ways of expressing things!
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