I started feeding my seedlings a diluted mixture last week. It seems they like it but will it help them to mature and flower a bit sooner? I'm hoping...

Tracey, trying your baggie method for some delayed hypogeal seed

They sure like the humidity in the Baggie method. Good luck with it Dave!

Should the bags be sealed?

If the medium is damp, I leave it closed. If you accidentally put too much water in the medium, then I'd leave it open a couple days to dry it out a bit. Overall, though, I leave the baggies closed to maintain a nice mildly moist setting.

Just took this photo of a few Oriental lily seedlings. They put up the first leaves after four months warm plus four months cold. Yeah, I stretched it out another month on each end to see how they do.

From left to right, Dynasty Strain, Summer's End Strain and Little Rascals Strain, all from The Lily Garden.

Oh, I like this! Interesting. I think you just lured me into trying some, also.

Correction on above post: Make that SILVER Summer's End, not plain ol' Summer's End. Judith describes them as outfacing white F1 hybrids from L.speciosum var. album.

Right now is the best time to start Oriental seeds. Three months warm takes them through November, then three months in the fridge through February. The seedlings above were started on Oct 27th, 2015, really pretty late for starting Orientals, especially when I planned on the four month intervals instead of three. I think now I will have to try to carry them over under lights. But since Judith's packets are 50 sds I can try again if I get them started ASAP!

Silver Summer's End sounds nice....

Tracey, I've always used a liquid seaweed fertiliser on my seedlings and they seem to like it. I think they do better with it than without, though I couldn't qualify that in any way with measurements!

Martagons are good to start now too. Like oriental seeds, they also need the cold period most often to put up their first leaf.

Pard, your oriental seedlings are looking good.

I guess we should clarify that now is a good time in the Northern Hemisphere to start Orientals,martagons and similar germinators.

Australis in the southern hemisphere said:Potted up a single L. szovitsianum seedling (from Darm Crook's NALS seeds) today. It had exhibited immediate hypogeal germination and sent up a leaf (which I didn't catch as early as I would have liked). The rest of the seeds are still in the container I started them in.

That's interesting, Joshua. I've never had a caucasian lily seed (that normally germinates DH (delayed hypogeal) go IH (immediate hypogeal) before, although I have with all the species' seed of the martagon section. Separating an IH germinated seedling from the rest of crop is a very delicate endeavor. Their first leaf is usually smaller than the DH germinating seedlings in the same lot. I try to wait as long as I can so the tiny leaf is more hardened off and more firm.* They often catch me by surprise, too, and end up so tiny/flimsy due to the initial lack of light. Don't be saddened by early die off of that first leaf, even if it is within days of the transplanting. That tiny seed bulblet is incredibly resilient, and will keep growing (very slowly) even without a leaf. I suppose one could, but I don't take the leaf's senescence as a queue to begin the cold treatment. Most often, because of the genetic difference that caused it to go IH, it will also send up another leaf (or more) in the course of its first growing season. And these seedlings will grow through the out of sync winter (likely inside to have warm temps) and continue through the first natural summer season.

IH transplants from normally DH germinating seed. Seed planted in fall of 2015, pic taken 16 July 2016. None of these have their original leaf still present. (The unusual looking one in the first pot is a Cyclamen purpurascens seedling). The second pot had an IH seedling that put up two first leaves. The root was unusual on this one, too.


Left to right:
Amelita x Super Tsing 15010 IH - 1
06-06-2 OP IH - 1 double leaf
1842-3 x AxST-3 15009 IH - 3
Amelita x Super Tsing 15011 IH - 1


*Sometimes (unfortunately) I need to remove the IH seedling soon after emergence because the rest of the crop needs to go into the cold treatment to stay on schedule.

@Leftwood - thanks for all that information. Darm Crook had noted on the Pacific Bulb Society wiki (http://www.pacificbulbsociety....) that occasionally L. szovitsianum exhibited IH germination, so I guess since I purchased one of his seed lots from the NALS that there was always a chance I'd get similar results.

Thank you for the warning about the first leaf dying off - having not done this before, I would have been rather disappointed had it died back after a few days! Regarding growing out-of-sync here - I started these seeds pretty late (so we're about to head into Spring here), so the DH seedlings will actually be more out-of-sync than the IH one (they're due to go into the fridge in November at the end of Spring, so unless I leave them in the fridge for longer, I will be growing them inside through next winter).

Does the type of light you use make a big difference? Does a regular fluorescent light work? Or is it advisable to go for an actual "grow" light that has the uva/uvb. Could I get some regular 4 foot shop lights?

Dave,

My experience has been to use "fresh" regular fluorescent light bulbs, good for a season or two. The price delta for the "grow" lights is pretty steep and at the time someone made the argument that the additional light spectrum available did not warrant the price. I used the fresh regular lights worked well for overwintering all types of orchids, bananas, and assorted tropical plants - it worked well.

Connie seems to be the one on this forum that uses them regularly so perhaps she can share her experience. Also, Hank Z. gave a nice write up on using 5080 LEDS (more efficient, but higher initial cost) that he was using and his seedlings looked very healthy.

I have used both regular shop lights as well as full spectrum grow lights. Hands down, I find the full spectrum grow bulbs work a whole lot better for my seedlings. They have the lumens specifically needed to advance plant growth. The others may in fact work, but not as well, in my opinion. After Hank's write up on LED lights, I will also try some of those to compare. Anything to help speed up the seed to flowering process will get my vote.

So we are on the same page here, "regular" means cool white fluorescent bulbs. If I am wrong, speak up now!

I think it is more about the intensity of usable wavelengths of light. The grow lights are definitely better in that respect, and this is why the red and blue LED lights do so well, despite the weird and seemingly dim light they emit. Whether they are worth the extra cost is up to you. I started out with two cool white bulbs per shoplight fixtures (both T12 and T8) and they work fine. Then got a four light T8 fixture and put in two cool whites and two warm whites... way better results, and my gut tells me better than four cool whites (but this is conjecture). I just haven't gotten around to trying the actual grow lights, stubborn, I guess. Now I also have a high output T5 two bulb fixture, with 6500K bulbs (daylight). The two bulbs put out almost exactly the same lumens as the four T8s, but the combo of cool and warm seems to be better.

I think you're going to be doing quite a bit of hybridizing in your future, so I recommend you start out new with either the 6500k growlights or LED, or a combination of both. Over time, you will naturally develop a system of lighting that 'fits in' with your total setup and how you germinate and raise your seedlings. Each one of us has a little different setup depending on what we do and how we do it. And we've been innovative in our total scheme of things. You'll have time to be innovative too, as you move from first year to second year to third year. But the type of lighting you choose now will be the one you'll most likely build around while developing your own unique system.

Thank you for the input everyone. Lol i wish I still had my aquarium equipment. I had a 6 foot and 4 foot light hood for each one that had full spectrum bulbs.
I have not heard too much on the topic of lights though so figured I would ask. I'm assuming that as with anything, you get what you pay for, but are the brands to stay away from?

I'm thinking about stopping into a place called Paradigm in Madison. They sell indoor garden products and I was referred there. But I'll compare their prices to amazon and other places.

I have seen the LED setups, and I love how energy efficient LED bulbs are. But not sure if i can swing that initial cost, but then again I probably won't NEED the lights until early next year when I get some epigeal seed going or the hypogeal I have going now come out of the fridge in February or so

No recommendations on brands, but there are a lot of stories that some of the individual LED bulbs in arrays go out in a matter of months. Most attribute it to shoddy manufacturing from that "other country", so do attempt to vet the vendors.