Successful scaling up from laboratory research to application in the field depends on practitioners being aware of the constraints and other interactions that arise as scaling up proceeds. Although exploration of promising ideas are often of intrinsic scientific interest, such ideas fail the test of utility if they do not get adopted by agronomists or plant breeders, and if practices and cultivars based on such ideas do not get adopted by farmers. This notion of scaling up is explored here using salinity tolerance of crops as a case study, with examples drawn from gene expression, tissue culture, controlled environment studies of plants grown in hydroponics and in pots, and the behaviour of plants at the field scale. The most effective research in this arena has resulted from a culture of collegiate dialogue between scientists working at different scales.