Polymerous said:Hi, Ken,
Briefly (I have to get back outside):
Heh, heh... I say that all the time. Thank you for taking the time to put together a most informative explanation.
When I ran large numbers of seedlings, I used weepy-hose made from recycled automobile tires, running it the length of the rows, which consisted of seedlings planted on 9" centers in rows spaced one foot apart. One foot spacing allowed the seepage from the hose on one row to meet the seepage from the next in my fertile, but heavy clay-based soil. The only problem I had with this system was spider mites, which absolutely thrived under the dry leaves. My solution was to hand water every two weeks using a fertilizer injector which metered a soluble fertilizer mix with a little wetting agent added. I would spray upward from ground level, rinsing the underside of the leaves. The wetting agent I used back then (something similar to ethylene glycol?) seems to have been pulled from the market, so an insecticidal soap would probably be a good, earth-friendly substitute. Of course, this was back in the mid 80's, before rust. I don't know if I'd want to do anything like this now, unless I was spraying regularly for rust, which I still haven't been able to bring myself to do. Maybe it could be done in the morning, maybe Dawn soap would be better as a wetting agent.
If you think you need supplementary water, I would suggest a 3' water wand with a Dramm water breaker which you could slowly drag between the rows at ground level. I'd rinse it after each row to wash off any spores it might have picked up.
Gophers, while they don't seem to have much of a taste for daylilies, have occasionally pulled a favorite completely down into their tunnels and apparently consumed it. They're nothing if not persistent. I once had a gopher find a tasty bromeliad root which had run from its container into the soil below, and the gopher tunneled up from below, chewing its way through the bottom of a fairly heavy black plastic nursery can in order to consume the whole plant. Also, a gopher's tunneling & mounding will bury small lined-out plants and cause root systems to dry out. I trap, but I have what seems to be an inexhaustible supply of them coming in from the open area behind me. Thankfully I don't have problems with deer, but the other critters; feral cats, raccoons, possums, crows, rats and possibly rabbits have managed to do enough damage to where I have to cage the smaller seedlings which are gang-planted in their 4" pots. The problem isn't necessarily the plants that are killed, (although many are set back), it's the disruption caused by them tipping, pulling, or dumping the containers, mixing seedlings and labels. I've grown out more than a few seedlings which have 3 lineage possibilities written on the tags. Mostly they're easy enough to sort out when they bloom, but it's still a pain to deal with. And if I don't happen to catch the damage early, the uprooted seedlings will desiccate in the sun. Crows and other large birds are particularly bad, because they'll go in and pluck out a seedling here and there, and it's often not noticed until it's too late. Once the seedlings are lined out in the beds, they don't pluck so easily, and pretty much take care of themselves.
The soil mix you have should retain a good amount of moisture. What I've noticed over the years is that daylily plants love moisture, but too much moisture also leads to flowers that don't open well. The other thing is the unsteady coastal weather and cool nights. I think most seedlings tend to bloom very early in the year on their maiden bloom, which means even cooler nights. The third factor is the nature of the flowers you are breeding with. If you cross two recalcitrant openers, the kids will tend to have that trait as well. Lastly, it's just the nature of the beast, I think. One of the most challenging aspects of daylily hybridizing is that the seedlings have flowers which are seldom "mechanically competent". The petals are either oddly-shaped, or so thick that they open poorly, or thin with poor substance. Here, with 55° nights persisting until late June, poor opening is one of the biggest problems. That's even before other considerations such as clear color, form, and plant habit. It can be discouraging. I've grown some tall bearded Iris seedlings, and they were, by contrast, quite reliable bloomers, which means that a good percentage of them would make perfectly acceptable garden plants. They might be plain compared to their parents, or the color might be a bit off-putting, but they tended to perform fairly well. Daylilies are another matter, which is why the percentage of keepers is fairly low. Makes it more fun, I suppose.
I have some large eucalyptus, and their roots are some of the most invasive. When I constructed my two 4' x 8' raised beds, I put them right on top of the ground, using 4x8 pressure treated landscape timbers, stacked double on their edges to make walls about 14" tall. First I leveled the area, and laid down a layer of tar paper, a 4' x 8' piece of ½" hardware cloth, followed by another layer of tar paper, followed by 8 mil black plastic, and one more layer of tar paper. My idea was that a gopher would have no reason to tunnel upward into a foul-tasting sheet of tar paper, but if it did, the wire would stop it. The tar paper also would keep any sharp points or edges on the hardware cloth from poking a hole in the plastic. I extended the black plastic a foot or so past the edges of the bed so that roots would not be able to sneak in unnoticed at the perimeter. After setting the timbers in place, I cut 24" wide "runners" of black plastic and lined the bottom, inside face and top of the timbers with them, in order to keep the wood from contact with the soil. That was topped off by a 2x6 cap board for protection. It was elaborate and painstaking, but they've lasted 30 years, with no gopher or root intrusions. The water inside manages to find its way out, even though no special allowances were made for drainage around the perimeter.
