Thread necromancy!
I'm very slowly nibbling round the edges of the mass of older threads here, hoping not to jump in with too much that's redundant, but figure if this was the proper place to say hello, I might resurrect it now and make a proper introduction.
Hello
I mentioned in gwhizz's thread - I'm Della and I grow lilies here in Hobart, Tasmania. After reading some about deer, voles, lily beetles, frozen ground and bad neighbours, I am so so glad I don't live err... where so many of you guys seem to be gardening. No offence >> ...I just think I'm really fortunate to be living here! The downside of course is the difficulty in getting new hybrids from the northern hemisphere - anything not shipped in by the container load for cut flower growers!
But I like breeding my own lilies, and I'd love to grow more of the species, so almost all my plants start from seed, and that's all good too. The things I really miss (never having had) are the North hybrids and the Candidum hybrids bred by Oliver Wyatt, but the latter may even have vanished from cultivation now - I've only seen a handful of pictures. Consequently one of my wishes is to hybridise with candidum... not me personally of course! :lol:
Anyone know of any Wyatt candidum hybrids still alive out there? Anyone want to swap seed from the candidum group of species for hmm... anything I can find to swap later in the year?
I'm rebuilding my collection after moving around and some years of depression - anything I have left now is a survivor! I've been growing lilies since.. I was going to say 12, but I remember that my first blooms from seed opened around my twelth birthday - they were yellow trumpets - which means I must have been 9 or 10 when I sowed the seed, in an icecream container on a science experiment bench in my primary school
I've been hybridising lilies since I was 12 though - that first cross was Trenwell (an old australian asiatic, golden yellow with strong black markings, almost dashes rather than spots) X Pink Champagne, another survivor from the past! I wonder if either are growing in gardens any more?
Most of my babies now are davidii descendents of many generations. I must have F5 or F6 generations out there now, even after long periods of breeding abstinence when I tried to forget the addiction
I had detailed records for many years... but when you move house a few too many times...
Some of my earliest lily memories are henryi and pardalinum, both taller than me and hence amazing to gaze up to, and duchartrei, who required squatting down to converse with, as it always seemed to tip over from winds, and bend upward again to say hello from the rockery border.
But I'm excited now to be renewing my enthusiasm, hopefully revisiting some old favourites and growing others for the first time. And this year I plan to eat my culls.
Has anyone else dabbled with cooking up their excess lily bulbs? Any recipes to share?
Just to end for now - one of my favourite babies; an F2 davidii hybrid:
I'm looking forward to summer and looking forward to learning from other lily nuts
