Viewing post #2572132 by Nightlily

plasko20 said:

I do understand exactly where you are coming from. But flowering is not an unnatural behavior, it is what they are supposed to do. Just a wee bit sooner. As for your other questions regarding long-term consequences, you have a great point. That is a complete unknown. Anything could happen, perhaps they might all die during winter because I messed with their homeostasis, who knows. But that cannot be answered without continued testing and observation.
However, if humanity relied on tried-and-tested we would still be living in caves and would have never gone to the moon. And, daylilies aside, at least for crop biology we need to find novel ways to increase crop densities to feed the millions of new mouths appearing on the planet every year as we breed unfettered like rats. So, intensive plant-research (including genetically-modified crops) is a must or mass starvation will soon occur. If we can gain the knowledge from crop research and then apply it to decorative vanity plants like daylilies, then we have lost nothing. I got the idea for the GA experiment after reading about it being used to increase commercial tomato harvests. I do see my garden as a fun laboratory as well as a pretty thing to look at. For example, just last year I got a fruit tree where branches from 5 different types of fruit were all grafted to the same trunk. I am excited to see it progress. It packs 5 trees into the space of just one, so is a massive space-saver (80% space saved). I have also tried grafting myself, trying to fuse 2 different types of magnolia together so the tree will flower in both yellow and pink (not successful yet), as well as performing experiments with rooting various types of cuttings, etc.
I think gardeners were the first scientists. Indeed, the monk Gregor Mendel is famous in history for his genetics research using pea plants in the 1800s. He is an inspiration.

Thanks for your explanation.
I live in a family of scientists - biology, molecularbiology, medical genetic engineering - we discussed this issue many times and all of my scientifically educated family members told me just one thing:
You will have to pay a price!

And this is what everybody that dreams of a bright future filled with genetically or hormonaly manipulated animals and plants has to keep in mind.
Look at our lovely blue planet - burning now in so many places - destroyed by more/faster/bigger/cheaper - this looks for me like the road to hell.