Everyone Can Breed Daylilies
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(Created page with "From beginner to expert. # Daylily breeding is amazingly easy.<br>No science or talent is needed beyond beginner gardening skills. Pollinate, collect the seeds, grow the seeds,...") |
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From beginner to expert. | From beginner to expert. | ||
| − | # Daylily breeding is amazingly easy.<br>No science or talent is needed beyond beginner gardening skills. Pollinate, collect the seeds, grow the seeds, then enjoy results. It takes one year in the south, and two to four years in the north. But if you want to breed well, there are many things you can learn to improve your results. This book is organized to tell you the easiest, simplest ways to breed daylilies, and then present a number of possible ways to improve your daylily breeding. | + | # Daylily breeding is amazingly easy.<br>No science or talent is needed beyond beginner gardening skills. Pollinate, collect the seeds, grow the seeds, then enjoy results. It takes one year to bloom in the south, and two to four years in the north. But if you want to breed well, there are many things you can learn to improve your results. This book is organized to tell you the easiest, simplest ways to breed daylilies, and then present a number of possible ways to improve your daylily breeding. |
# Why breed daylilies? | # Why breed daylilies? | ||
# How to breed daylilies. | # How to breed daylilies. | ||
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## Growing seedlings. | ## Growing seedlings. | ||
## Evaluating seedlings. | ## Evaluating seedlings. | ||
| + | ## Naming seedlings. | ||
| + | # Selling your introductions. | ||
# Choosing breeding goals. | # Choosing breeding goals. | ||
| − | # | + | ## Who is your target market? |
| + | ## What do they want and why? | ||
# The science of breeding daylilies. | # The science of breeding daylilies. | ||
## There is hardly any science involved in daylily breeding. You do not need to know plant anatomy, genetics, Punnet Squares, probability, pigment biochemistry, tissue culture, measuring yields, genetic engineering or any of the other knowledge of professional plant breeders. | ## There is hardly any science involved in daylily breeding. You do not need to know plant anatomy, genetics, Punnet Squares, probability, pigment biochemistry, tissue culture, measuring yields, genetic engineering or any of the other knowledge of professional plant breeders. | ||
## Plant breeding textbooks do not even list the type of breeding daylily breeders do. We do something very similar to the line breeding of animal breeders, but that is not that same as what plant breeders call line breeding. And we definitely are not hybridizing, according to the modern sense of the word, even thought we often loosely call it that. | ## Plant breeding textbooks do not even list the type of breeding daylily breeders do. We do something very similar to the line breeding of animal breeders, but that is not that same as what plant breeders call line breeding. And we definitely are not hybridizing, according to the modern sense of the word, even thought we often loosely call it that. | ||
## We are starkly ignorant of the genetics of daylilies, compared to the genetics of food crops. There are few well-characterized gene/allele based characteristics, and there is no table of which plants possess them or not. | ## We are starkly ignorant of the genetics of daylilies, compared to the genetics of food crops. There are few well-characterized gene/allele based characteristics, and there is no table of which plants possess them or not. | ||
| + | ## Diploids versus tetraploids and conversions. | ||
| + | ## Breeding pseudoscience. | ||
| + | # Breeding strategies. | ||
| + | ## Choosing parents. | ||
| + | ## Planning multi-generational goals. | ||
| + | ## How many seedlings do you need? | ||
| + | ## Selection. | ||
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| + | Assorted notes: | ||
| + | <pre> | ||
| + | Many daylily lovers are in awe of daylily breeders, but hybridizing is really | ||
| + | no more difficult than growing daylilies. While the best hybridizers are | ||
| + | remarkably hard-working, skilled and knowedgeable, such talents are developed | ||
| + | gradually over years. | ||
| + | |||
| + | You don't need to know any science. | ||
| + | Any drunken bumblebee can pollinate and hybridize. | ||
| + | We actually don't know enough science about daylilies to use it effectively. | ||
| + | General gardening knowledge is sufficient. | ||
| + | There is lots of nonsense out there too. | ||
| + | |||
| + | Hybridizing can be cheap and low-technology. | ||
| + | No need for microcentrifuge tubes to store pollen. | ||
| + | No need to store pollen if you are willing to limit yourself. | ||
| + | No need for reverse forceps to hold stamens: | ||
| + | |||
| + | Daylily breeding takes a long time. | ||
| + | Even bloom the first year of seedlings in the south means that it may take several years for the several generations you need to achieve your goals. | ||
| + | In the north, where it takes 2 or 3 years to bloom a seedling, it is much slower unless you resort to high greenhouse culture. | ||
| + | |||
| + | Two generations can do what you want, if you grow enough seedlings. | ||
| + | Genetics be damned! | ||
| + | 1 generation if combining dominant characters. | ||
| + | 2 generations if combining recessive characters. | ||
| + | 1 to many generations if combining quantitative characters. | ||
| + | Nobody has yet demonstrated any complicated genetic factors that can affect your breeding. | ||
| + | More generations | ||
| + | Breeding is a game of numbers and generations. | ||
| + | You can get something good in your first few years. | ||
| + | |||
| + | You can breed faster with diploids than tetraploids. | ||
| + | You can combine traits with fewer seedlings and generations. | ||
| + | You can lose traits more easily as well. | ||
| + | More genetic diversity. | ||
| + | Many tetraploid breeders made their reputations starting with tetraploid conversions, which have double or quadruple doses of genes that may be less frequent in tetraploids. Stamile and Trimmer to name a couple. | ||
| + | Somebody needs to breed the diploids that tet breeders convert. | ||
| + | |||
| + | You do not need to keep records. | ||
| + | But you can benefit from them, and records are easy to keep. | ||
| + | Pauline Henry. | ||
| + | |||
| + | Selection cannot work without testing. | ||
| + | Apples at Geneva Agricultural Experiment Station. | ||
| + | Evaluating seedlings under high culture. Pesticides, fertilizer, irrigation, etc. that are not going to be present in gardens or other plantings. | ||
| + | |||
| + | You do not need articulable goals. You can just play. | ||
| + | The best breeders have goals. Good and different. | ||
| + | |||
| + | You do not need to buy the newest and most expensive plants unless you are competing for the latest fashion. And maybe not even then. | ||
| + | You will always be 2 or more generations behind the breeder of that super new plant. People will want it because they've seen what it can breed for its hybridizer. | ||
| + | But if you are breeding for a different goal, you don't need it. | ||
| + | Reilly trick of remaking the cross with the cheap parents. | ||
| + | Getting pollen from a friend. | ||
| + | Buying seed from it. Drawback: if one in 100 is better than the parent, you are likely to be disappointed. | ||
| + | |||
| + | You don't need to own a daylily form. | ||
| + | You don't need a business. It can be informal. | ||
| + | Naming and registering your seedlings is really easy. | ||
| + | You don't need to sell your introductions. | ||
| + | </pre> | ||
