Leftwood said:
Like you, Della, I often leave stamens on pod parent flowers that I pollinate. Sometimes I still want the pollen for something else. In such a case, I usually remove two or three stamens that will get in the way the most. Pollen stained fingers don't bother me, anyway. 
But I doubt that that actually bothers any of us.....
Your 5 year old just may be a budding future botanist!
I do "way-out" pollination crosses, too. Heck, when you've got the pollen and the pod parent, what have you got to lose? David Sims crossed martagons with asiatics and they are a called martasians. He always had to use the embryo rescue tichnique, since the resulting hybrid embryo was not compatible with the seed endosperm. But you never know, Della. Black Beauty was one of those one-in-ten-thousand crosses. When Leslie Woodriff forst showed off his success, no one believed him.
The more pollen the better! I love the range of colours in pollen, and the delicate way each anther swivels on the end of its filament. I'm prone to just removing a whole anther and transfering straight from that, or straight from the dried, stored anthers. I'm rather sure if I had brushes they would be just that many more things I'd lose just when I needed them! My fingers, on the other hand....
My young budding botanist is also learning that all those "pollums" spread over the table drying on bits of wax paper, are in fact all different, but she is in fact a mother hen, and gets rather more clucky about the lily mums with their foil caps. I hope it lasts! I thought I might let both kids choose a cross of their own to make this year, and see how their patience holds out waiting 2-3 years for the results!
Embryo rescue fascinates me - I'm very keen to learn the technique. Done a little tissue culture before, many years ago, and once even had the plans for a home-made laminar flow cabinet, but I'm back to square one I think, in re-learning and refreshing! There's no better inspiration than a new, beautiful lily...
I've seen a few pictures of the martasians, and think they're lovely. Folk that stick persistantly at a seemingly impossible cross really have my admiration. It can't hurt at all to try - odds of 1 in 10,000 take some beating!
