I wish people would not feel obligated to give bonus seeds or fans when they really don't want to. Several sellers like Rich, Todd, Codster and others give wonderful bonus seeds... Gramps... wonderful bonus fans... Rich (CTDaylily) wonderful bonus fans... others as well... they consider what you buy and they give a gift that they feel you will appreciate. I love those sellers. Others, give you extra seeds of the same crosses (JustSue).. and too many fan sellers to mention... I love all of those sellers as well!

However, quite a number give you bonus seeds or fans of the most common run of the mill daylilies when you are clearly buying with a purpose in mind... toothy, sculpted cristate, poly, patterned... whatever. And for the love of all that is holy how do they manage to send the one color you hate?.

This past summer I purchased fans of maybe 50 different varieties... i was sent 15 bonus varieties (plus extra fans)... of those 15... 6 were thoughtful gifts and 9 were... gee whiz I have to send a bonus fan because all the better sellers do... what orange mundane daylily do I have on the heap can I wrap in a nice shiny bow? Haha... I mean how did those sellers know that I hate orange... 7 of the 9 were Orange! It can't be random... LOL Don't they realize that digging thru the pantry to re-gift items you never wanted, that nobody ever once put on a holiday list defeats the purpose of gifting in the first place? Bonuses are a marketing strategy... but one that fails miserably if the buyer is left with a cringe rather than a smile.

So... as I sort thru my seeds, making my list and checking it twice, carefully noting sellers as naughty or nice... i stare at seeds of unfortunate crosses... nothing you'd want just crap one oft tosses... As visions of orange petals dance in my head, i ask, do these seeds deserve to be dead? With i sigh i snap closed the bonus seed tin, before placing it back in my middle fridge bin!

Guess i'll give 'em a shot and maybe buy goat for the inevitable.


(Moderator edit to correct terminology)

I sympathize with you, Jeff. Some of them say to make a list of ones you'd like for a bonus. I started taking them up on the offer!

I agree with thank you bonuses. Most are good. If and when we sale good bonuses make customers come back. I was like alot of people that didnt like orange daylilys. Just ditch lilys.
Then some seeds i planted came up. Drat orange.
Right wrong 4 oranges survived the cut. This is one of them

Diggerofdirt said:I agree with thank you bonuses. Most are good. If and when we sale good bonuses make customers come back. I was like alot of people that didnt like orange daylilys. Just ditch lilys.
Then some seeds i planted came up. Drat orange.
Right wrong 4 oranges survived the cut. This is one of them

Impressive petals on that one... i did buy 1 seed cross w orange... Snarl x Dad's Black Gold... figured that might be worth a shot

goedric said:
(Moderator edit to correct terminology)

@Char, you are editing user posts to correct terminology?!?

I don't think I've seen you do this before? Curious to understand the extent to which you will be doing this

I don't normally need to edit text in our members posts and would prefer to keep it that way. The member who wrote the post above and members in general were asked to please use the correct terminology, cristate, with a message that further usage of the incorrect terminology would be edited in my post on Nov 16th

I meant it.
https://garden.org/thread/view...

The thread "Fertility in Bearded Daylilies Why are most pollen infertile Advice on F3 cross?" in Daylilies forum

Edited to say, LOL.

I used to like orange, but.
I did get one last year, Blazing Lampsticks X HNF. This hasn't bloomed yet, and might not turn out to be the O color.

SueVT said:Edited to say, LOL.

"the O color.

haha i like that... and i would definitely bid on anything with Heavenly New Frontiers in the mix...

My HNF's first bloom occurred so late in the season that snow hit like a week after i crossed it with vampire lady...



so.. considered cutting the scape and putting it in water but i feared it was just too early... so i brought it indoors... foolish perhaps but i wanted those seeds... and i also worried since it had only been in the ground a couple months... it could die in a bad winter...



haha yes, i'm crazy... as of today it has one pod left to ripen... was able to collect 25 seeds so far... and it's under very strong lights for the winter..

whoa, fantastic! Look at the pods on that thing!!!

the only thing that I noticed last year about the bonuses, was that a couple of sellers gave me entirely non-viable seeds as bonuses. Probably these were very old seeds, I am guessing. I mean, possibly. I planted everything, and spent time and seedling space trying to get these to grow.

So this year I have received crazy over-the-top fabulous bonuses from some of the people you mentioned, and it will be a challenge to plant them all.

Now they tell me, pa rum pum pum pum
They don't want orange bonus seeds, pa rum pum pum pum
It was a gift to them, pa rum pum pum pum
I have no mind reading skills, pa rum pum pum pum
Rum pum pum pum, rum pum pum pum

Is why they call them bonus seeds, rum pum pum pum

I do birthday parties too, just so you know.

The song and poem are great! I also love Orange Daylilies...and every other color under the sun, come to think about it.

I went around for years, bragging that I had Concord Militia from Bob Seawright. It is really bright and deep orange with a red eyezone, very eye-catching in the garden! I still have two clumps, the only trouble is that it is an extremely slow increaser.

I don't know what color I like any more. I had a white seedling this year that fascinated me. It just has a presence. And now, thanks to Steve Todd, I am going to have stripey seedlings with any luck. That might spoil me for everything else. I have been wondering if you could get a pink striped daylily.... maybe, since I believe Steve mentioned that the stripeyness (not sure of the term for this), is dominant.

And, what is more important, form or color? Some of the most impressive toothy daylilies have a sort of muted coloration that might make them disappear in the garden. I will be finding out this year.

Many of the garden pictures I have seen, show an overall pinky-yellow sea of blooms. Something for me to work on in terms of garden design. I think the CP children will produce strong accents that will be useful in defining shape and structure.

Jeff, that HNF plant in the house is just crazy cool!

Ahead said:Now they tell me, pa rum
I do birthday parties too, just so you know.

Haha my birthday is coming up!

Received a bonus of a cross I didn't expect. So thoughtful, featuring one of the parents I had paid for and love to pieces. Unfortunately, checked on them a little while ago, and all 3 bonus seeds are now moldy.

Mary,

We're those bonus seeds from me?

Mary. I once had a pack with 5 seeds in it that had a mold problem. I wiped them off with a strong bleach solution (like a capful in a quart of water). I decided to plant them anyway, and three of them bloomed for me. So, maybe consider cleaning and repacking them until you are ready to plant. You may get lucky with one.

I have done that, too, Tim, with seeds that had mold on them, but were still firm. It worked for me, too.

No, they weren't from you, Steve. Your seeds are fabulous!

Ok, I'll try washing them, but I've done that countless times in the past, and they were just dead on the inside. So it never worked for me.

Well, anything can happen! Sorry you couldn't save them.