Captan seems to be banned for use in California.
Bored over the xmas holidays I thought I'd have a bit of fun, fished a bulb from the ground and gently chopped her up.
Oops, forgot, I'm out of fungicide. Wait, didn't you get in hot water last time you used-up the cinnamon as an anti-fungal, you are on notice what to do?
I soaked the slices for 20 mins in a dilute bleach solution then placed in sterile media.



Checking on them this week, whew... don't smell too good but only one rotter to toss. Rinsed them in a solution of Potassium Bicarbonate a "green" alternative.
This is new ground for me.
What do you folks use when scaling, what would you try if you had to change?
Brian

I use dilute bleach, it seems to work just fine. I don't anticipate having to change but in the event the EPA decides to ban my bleach it will be over my dead body.

Captan has been banned for many years throughout the USA.

I don't use any added fungicides. The few time that I have tried a bleach solution haven't been advantageous or disadvantageous. I do use inherently "sterile" media, like vermiculite, perlite, sand and sphagnum moss.

I tend to rely on a natural, healthy mix of organisms, big and small, that when done right keep each other in healthy check. Even for seeds (of all kinds, not just lilies) the media might start out mostly a pasteurized store bought potting mix, but with sand from an outdoor gravel pit, or perhaps a handful of outside garden soil. I don't wash my pots before seeding, or bleach them.

Heresy, some people will say... to each their own.

Brian, it looks as if you actually did do chopping with a knife, akin to what is done (chipping) with a lot of smaller bulb species, like snowdrops, chionodoxa, some species tulips, etc.

Obviously, it works!

A coulpe things you might want to think about:
---- For Lilium species and hybrids, the normal alternative to your chipping is removing scales individually. This drastically cuts down on the amount of freshly cut surface area that is ripe for easy infection by pathogens. I think if I had tried your chipping method combined with my laissez faire attitude, things might not have turned out so well. In your case, I think it was a good thing that you bleached them.

--- The fact that the bag didn't smell so good means that reactions/organism growths were going on that you don't want. Most likely, this was caused by (or encouraged by) the media being too moist. Barely moist is your aim. If water condenses on the inside of the bag, the media is too moist.

Adapted the idea from Hippeastrum protocol I think is called Twin Scaling. Cut the bulb vertically through the basal plate into eight pieces, pie slices. Then separate two scales at time again cutting down through the BP. Hipps are going to need some protection after that kind of cutting. Did want to try out this method to see if the starts were larger than single scales.
Man how old was that can of poison I had? It lasted forever since I only used it when emotionally attached to a project.
Bleach is the usual go to.
Brian

Hi Brian: My approach is very much like Leftwoods, perhaps even more casual and laid back. Over time I've learned what works good enough for me; things I really have to pay attention to, and things I don't. I use whole scales whenever possible. Even outer scales if they are fresh. I never rinse them with fungicide or bleach. I do let them dry at least one day away from sun and heat. And I like to pasteurize my soil/media mix. I don't use growth stimulants and I shy away from any part of potting mix that are usually nutrient fortified. I use mainly a mix of my own garden soil and milled moss. I don't do any slice and dice cloning since i'm only going after a few and not several. I deal mainly with Trumpet cross seedling cloning.

Below is a picture of a couple from a scaling excersize I did with my 5 yr old Grand Daughter last fall. That gives you the Idea of how I do it. She wanted to look at them and take pictures to show here little buddies and teacher. They were about 5 weeks along at this point and were put back in the ziplock bag ( with sterile tweezers here) to finish.

This picture tells me alot. It tells me my moisture contents a little high, my temperature was a little high and my nutrient content is a little high. I can say that because the root system is a little too far advanced for mid point progress. My goal is to have the clone use up all of the mother scales energy rather than support itself, leaving the mother scale to rot. No water droplets were seen inside the bag because the higher temp allowed the higher dewpoint to mask it, so the bag was left open a couple more days, then allowed to finish before refigeration.

See the 5 largest bublets? I call those 'hogs'. They will hog the mother scales nutrients at a much faster rate during the last couple weeks and the 'runts' will most often dissappear.

Brian, I think in the end, you'll develope your own system that works for you and what you're trying to achieve. My info is just for background.

Yep, I'm trying to grow "hogs" as you put it.
Single scales, of note the larger outer scales (higher sugar etc.), yeild just fine.
Looking for quality here and I think I knew fewer starts were likely.
Thanks!
Brian

Yes Brian, I'd aways rather have a few nice, well developed clones than a whole bunch of little clusters. They're easier to deal with and survive better thru planting. And I've found also that the amount of clones per scale is different for each Division and development rate differs as well from one Division to another. Trumpets and Aurelians are low yielders.

Funny, I'd probably get an 'A' in the academics of cloning in a test. But I've learned 'what I can get away with' and still be successful in such a casual, laid back kind of way.

Twin scaling, yes. I've thought about it a lot and decided (my own conjecture here) that it is meant more for bulbs where individual scales cannot be easily separated or where the inclusion of part of the basal plate is mandatory (and to do that it is more practical to use two scales instead of one). Or a combination of both scenarios.

A good experiment, no matter what. Any preliminary results of scaling versus twin scaling?

Well, my Dad did twin scaling in 8s. He INSISTED that retaining basil was a MUST for higher healthier, successful yield. Multiplication was the name of his game; his greatest sense of achievement. I know he got alot more bulblet production but I don't recall any of them being any larger than mine--if that large even. But it sure as heck worked for him. He'd take a dormant pot of 3 that somebody didn't want to winter over (and that he wanted) and, in what seemed no time, had numbers exceeding 1000 or more. Sound silly? The 1000 figure is understated! Back in the days of the old blue-green copper and captan fungicides.

But my objectives are totally different than his were. It would be nice if somebody on this forum would be doing this. I'd be real interested in what the differences might be between the Divisions with twin scaling.

Brian, are you going to try some more?