Well I really like the green center. Gives the flower a chocolate-mint kinda thing goin' on. Maybe that's another future name... )

But I think the anther color is distracting.

Hank, I like how the pollen color lights up the flower and brings it to life

A nice one this morning from a 2012 cross.

What an unusual effect with the paler stripes along the petal centres! Not sure how I feel about it but looks like a lovely healthy plant so maybe it's a feature worth playing with.

All in all a tough year here for the lilies. Lost around 40% of the new asiatic seedlings in the pots due to an invasion of voles. The new lily seedlings are now in a hardware cloth cage structure for the winter.

The black squirrel from hell that someone has brought into the neighborhood as a pet is still here doing damages.

I had to spend quite a bit of time this summer watering due to drought conditions. Made the decision to minimize the number of crosses on the seedlings in the pots so as not to stress the plants. For the most part I tried to restrict the crosses to the commercial expendable lilies.

Just finished checking on what i will have to plant this winter (flowers for 2018) from some of the tango lily crosses that produced seeds. Good pods and seeds on Cafe Noir, Thesire, and Purple eye.



Also have seeds from a cross of the yellow sibling of 12-183 orange with white center onto Purple Eye

I'll say it again, Hank you do wonderful work. I enjoy the look of your seedlings.

Beautiful-looking crosses!

Lily seeds off to the NALS seed exchange tomorrow. Just finished getting them counted/packaged and in the box.

Fewer crosses than I normally do due to drought conditions we had here this summer.

The seeds from Cafe Noir are tiny tiny, but they are good looking seeds with nice embryos.

Hank

Nice to see a photo of 11-231. I was so impressed by the photo's that you posted on this site last year, I ended up selecting a packet of your Ortega x 11-231 from this years NALs seed exchange. Very nice work Hank!

Brilliant work Hank

Noticed in the sidebar a day or so ago Lisa's pix of Heartfire. That one went back quite a ways, around 1996 or 97 from B&D if I recall correctly. Smaller size flowers, but a nice inflorescence for a 1a lily.
I probably have seeds in the freezer of some crosses using Heartfire.
A few pix follow, the first my pic of Heartfire, the others of a cross done in 1997 using an early seedling x Heartfire.

Hank, you certainly do have some beautiful seedlings. Here is a tango seedling that bloomed for the first time this year that I am pleased with, and look forward to seeing the siblings bloom this year.
Jim

Welcome to garden.org Jim. That is a really nice seedling. I like the array of colors, especially the yellow in there that highlights the whole blossom.

@JimSaskatoon Hi Jim and welcome to our lily group. You may well find some familiar names here! As I was investigating your image proposal this morning it occurred to me that you were the breeder of 'In the Zone'. Good job on that one! I love the Canadian bred lilies, for me, much preferred over the Dutch introductions.

Like Tracey, I think your tango seedling is wonderful. Keep up the good work.

Thank you Connie and Tracey. The tango seedling is actually a seedling involving my 'In the Zone'. I have been concentrating lately on asiatic hybrids with ruffled edged flowers such as this one.
Jim

Hi Jim and

I love your work with asiatics, look forward to seeing many more of your seedlings!

Here is another from this breeding line. It does not have quite as much ruffling, but the colour combinations are interesting.
Jim

The ruffled edges are really nice, very noticeable and provide a lovely accent. Congratulations of doing some very fine work, Jim.

Many of my favorite asiatic lilies come from Canadian hybridizers. Keep them coming. They do very well in my Midwestern climate and as you know, the Dutch don't really focus their breeding on lilies for the garden.

I for one am a big fan of your ruffled edged lilies. The pastel blend in the last photo is very nice too. While I'm at it, I might as well say that out to down facing lilies are my favorite orientations.

Here are a couple more from the ruffled line.
Jim