I love patented plant varieties and appreciate the hard work and amazing results of these breeders works. However, I've had the following questions come to mind over the past few years of gardening.

1. I have a running Tiarella that is patented and it is "asexually propagating" itself all over the flower bed. Do I need to be pulling out runners if they start rooting, or am I okay letting it spread? What happens if a runner is accidentally severed? Do I have to then remove every shoot from that point on?

2. I read that Geranium 'Jolly Bee' had its patent invalidated in a court dispute with the patent holder of Geranium 'Rozanne'. Seeing that 'Jolly Bee' came from different parentage than 'Rozanne' and no longer carries a valid patent, does this mean that I can start dividing the plants that I have?

3. I have a couple Heucheras I bought several years ago. For two years I've been looking for more. There is no address listed for the Great Britain patent holder. What does someone do if the variety is no longer commercially available but it still has a few years left on the patent? I know that Google has been making copyrighted e-books available of out-of-print works even though they don't have the author's permission or a licensing agreement. Does this also apply to "out-of-print" patented plants?