Growing Daylilies Together

I'm wondering if there is any general guidelines on this. Is it the pollen parent or the pod parent that affects the edges on a seedling? I'm also wondering which parent is typically responsible for the bud count and branching.

Becki

Hi Becki...hope all is well with you

I find both parents contribute to all these characteristics. Using Mick's suggestions to cross a dormant with the SEVs and EVs you will get the best of both worlds. I have discovered this to be true though my own trial and error here. IE: I have has two less than optimal branched parents here...( most likely due to loss of branching through bringing a southern plant northward) give me a super branched kiddos here up north. It really is trial and error..until you find the magic combinations. Rock Candy, Italian Kaleidoscope and Rita Sue have been giving me great branched kids here. Same with edges..both parents contribute but some parents have the propensity to do it more. I have found Heartbeat of Heaven, Singular Sensation, Darla Anita, Judy Farquhar, best Edge genetics, Wonder of it All, Boundless Beauty, Fringy..to be wonderful to bring in edges... hoping more peeps will chime in with their suggestions.

Doing your research in the AHS database..will show you what the kids look like from combinations of different genes. Even if 1/2 of the stats are REAL, you will get a good idea of what a parent will throw.

That is why mydaylilies.com and the sharing we do here is so important. It helps you learn the potential of a cross. That is why it is important for members to share their genetics with each other. If we share we will all move the daylily forward so much faster..and with greater success. I encourage all people who sharing their seedling photos to also share the genetics behind them. For those who do so, I am grateful, as it helps me to find the successful parents for certain traits.

I recommend watching the website..and identifying parents who produce the offspring you desire. Watch for the parents that throw the edges and branching via the membership descriptions. I always ask people who share their genetics if they do not post it with their seedlings. Some oblige while others do not.

Spring is on its' way!
Claudia
Still facing two more snowstorms on the way!!!!
photo Moonlit Hayride (Singular Sensation x Kenn Mt. Hayride) got branching and edge... 2 southerns, hardy here!

Generally both parents contribute equally to the genetics of daylily characteristics.

A hybridizer can always check this if they have doubts, by making their crosses in both directions, [called reciprocal crosses] for example, pod parent A x pollen parent B producing seedlings AB and pod parent B x pollen parent A producing seedlings BA. The two different sets of seedlings would need to be planted in two or more different locations in the field or garden and in enough numbers to make valid comparisons. They cannot be simply planted side by side in two different rows or locations.

Let's say we do this for 10 sets of parents, producing seedlings: AB versus BA, CD versus DC, EF versus FE, GH versus HG and so on. We would find that generally there was no statistically significant difference between the seedlings produced by reciprocal crosses. Rarely, there might be a difference but sometimes that might be in favour of a particular cultivar as the pod parent and other times that might be in favour of a particular cultivar as the pollen parent. It is unlikely that there would be any general pattern that could be used to make a rule.

There is one general tendency that may be reasonable to watch for, called maternal effects. In most plant species the size of the seed affects the characteristics of the seedling. Such effects may only be temporary but they may last for quite a few years. No one has looked scientifically at the effects of seed size on daylily seedling characteristics. Nevertheless it may be a good idea when making a cross between a cultivar that produces large seeds and a cultivar that produces small seeds to use the large seeded cultivar as the pod parent.

There are also a very few characteristics that are not determined equally by both parents, for example, cytoplasmic male sterility and some forms of albinism or variegation. In those cases it is the pod parent that most often determines the characteristic in the seedling. Those characteristics are not the typical ones that are important usually to daylily hybridizers.

There is a more detailed article in the Daylily Journal. My apologies if the article is difficult to understand - there are word count limits on journal articles and it is difficult to explain complex effects simply in short articles.

Daylily Genetics Part 4.
Pod or Pollen Parent: Do They Determine Different Seedling Characteristics?
The Daylily Journal Winter 2011 66(4):42-45.

I remember this article and it did a lot ( for me) to debunk prior thoughts on which parent was responsible for what traits. I thank you for writing this article and glad it was printed in the journal. Thank you, Claudia

Thank you both for jumping in here!
Maurice, I have not read that article but am on my way right now to do so. Thank you, thank you, thank you...
Claudia, I am doing well, thank you and SOO ready for Spring! Only 25 more days now. YEAH!

Hugs,

Becki

The Daylily Journal Winter 2011 66(4):42-45. The electronic form can read this article?

Tatyana Goreva wrote:
If you are a member of the American Hemerocallis Society you should be able to login into the AHS Portal and from there you can download the article.

However, I have noticed that Google can see the article and therefore anyone (even non-members) can download the article. The AHS webmaster knows this but it has not been changed.

So, you can download the article from:
www.daylilynetwork.org/resource/resmgr/website_reprints/geneticspart4forweb.pdf

Maurice

I recognize that both parents contribute to all of its characteristics.

So glad that this site is build up for the reason to help each other who loves plants and gardening as well. We indeed get a very valuable information.