I can't really call myself a 'hybridizer' since all I do is occasionally dab a bit of pollen here and there. In fact, this year was a terrible year here, and I have collected all of 5 seed pods, and I believe they are all bee pods - so I am going to have "unknowns x unknowns" next year. (cats got in my bowls I was drying them in, have no clue which one is which any more!)
But I do like to buy seeds on the LA! It allows me to afford genetics I otherwise wouldn't be able to get until the prices dropped to a more reasonable amount. Granted, even with seeds I have a price limit!
I too have discovered the "on the rocks" method of germinating, love it! I have 45 seedlings that are a year old planted in their own bed, some were pretty, a couple were really nice, and some were pretty ugly. But because only half have bloomed so far, and it was a pretty awful year with the heat and the drought, I am letting things go for another year. I do have one that I will register in a few years. It happened to bloom on my older sisters birthday, and is pretty, so it is garden named "Patty's Gift" It was one of my favorite seedlings this year, and is from seeds either given to me, or purchased off the LA.
I only planted a dozen seeds this year, and have lost half of them due to the awful summer - and the fact that my tomato plant overgrew EVERYTHING (yeah, I mix my flowers and veggies) . But the ones that are growing, look good so far. We will see how this batch does through the winter.
As for how I got into daylilies, my grandfather used to hybridize daylilies and Iris in North Dakota. This was long before I ever arrived on the scene. But this grandfather used to visit my other grandfather in western PA every couple of years. Behind my PA grandfathers cottage, was a daylily hybridizer. Acres and acres of nothing but daylilies, which I used to enjoy running through as a child in the 1960's. ND grandpa used to purchase a few from this hybridizer.
My father loved daylilies and iris, surprisingly enough, we never had daylilies at our suburban house in the Cleveland, OH area. We only had one TB iris, which is the only iris that survived a devastating fire at my ND grandfather's greenhouse one year. I still have some of that iris, and someday after I get stats on it, I will register it in my grandfathers name.
After my divorce, I started with some of the old daylilies from our PA cottage, since now we own a portion of what was once a thriving daylily field, but is now overgrown with everything - and 50 years later, those historic dips are still thriving, even in the woodsy area. So that winter, I was bored and searching on the internet, and like others, discovered the wonderful world of daylilies, the various plant forums, and the LA
. As for the iris (which I too, haven't figured out how to hybridize yet) Schreiners sent me a catalog.
It's amazing, but the new daylilies are NOT the daylilies I grew up with!
Since I got back into gardening, I have gone from one bed of hostas, to 7 flower beds (some of which are works in progress) and a couple of historic NOID dip dayllies to perhaps 200 (counting my seedlings) Granted, this all occurred in just a couple of years.
I really don't expect to do more than just dab at hybridizing. In fact, because I am already over involved in volunteering, I refuse to join any local clubs (but do belong to AHS) for now.
Obviously, daylilies aren't just a business or hobby, they are an ADDICTION. So I try to enable as many folks as I can whenever possible.
~Jan
