beckygardener said:Since I grow many seedlings, I can tell you that I have some disappear every year.
Seedlings can disappear for many reasons. Some disappear here over winter.
One of my favorite seedlings from last year has completely disappeared over our mild Winter. I fear it is a goner. It has dormant genetics in it's pedigree.
One would have to watch such a seedling reasonably carefully and notice how it was growing from the time it sprouted to get clues about what is happening.
It's siblings have not totally disappeared and are sending up new foliage. (I know each seedling is unique.)
One needs some clues about its growing behaviour before and as it disappeared. Is it not possible that its leaves simply aged and dried up as they would when they had reached their expected lifespans? Or did they yellow and die very rapidly?
If they are heat sensitive, why don't they die or drop their foliage in the Summer/Fall?
When were the seeds planted? When did they sprout? How many leaves did they grow? When did they stop producing new leaves? When did the leaves start to yellow and die? I would normally expect a daylily that is having heat problems to become summer dormant (lose its leaves early during the heat) and then grow a new crop later. However, there is a catch. A researcher has looked at the death of seedlings. If they do not grow large enough they are apparently unable to form a bud. Those apparently die. Seedling death over winter is related to seedling size entering winter. If a daylily seed sprouts before the heat of the summer and then loses its leaves due to summer dormancy and it is not big enough it may not sprout ever again.
Assume that your seedling has quite normally grown and then lost its leaves due to their age and set a bud and stopped growing. Did its siblings stop growing? Not whether its siblings lost all their leaves or just some of them. To know if a daylily is dormant one needs to look in the centre of the fan of leaves. If one sees a short leaf then come back every few days and check whether a new short leaf appears on the other half of the fan opposite from the previous new leaf. As long as new short baby leaves keep appearing every few days assume the meristem is not dormant. When no new baby leaves appear for a longer period (and the temperature did not become too low) then assume the meristem is dormant (in both cases one may be incorrect but it is the best one can do). After a certain time the old mature leaves will die. If no new baby leaves have appeared in the meantime then the bud will be completely underground. That is normal behaviour. After the passage of sufficient time new baby leave should start appearing again.
If the fan does not sprout and you check the spot where it was last seen what do you find?
Each daylily will have its own time when new leaf growth will appear - one cannot predict. In Gainesville Watkins indicated that Hyperion did not appear until late in spring, Mikado appeared in early March. In Texas, Hyperion appeared in early March.
