Viewing post #936797 by Phenolic

caitlinsgarden said:I am still not sure what a virused lily looks like; do they have splotchy blooms? And what do you mean lilies die of old age? Of course you keep planting the new divisions, right? If every new bulb was the same age as the original, it wouldn't be possible to have a lily business. They all would have died of old age. Maybe I just don't understand what you mean?

Roosterlorn said:Yes, you do ---you just said it in a round about way. In that whole first paragraph above, I'm speaking about the aging process of a SINGLE LILY BULB, not an entire population or group. I'm eluding to the fact that older, vintage hybrid bulbs like Silk Road will live carefree for a good 20 years or more in the same spot while many of the newer hybrids look like they're 80 years old in less than 5 years.

As far as virus and diseases go, I think they get a lot more attention and discussion than they deserve. It's not something a backyard gardener needs to learn all about before they start gardening. They are, in fact, quite rare. Believe me, if you have a lily that comes down with a virus, you'll see it--it'll look sick compared to others and you'll know something is obviously wrong. But, in the meantime, if you want to study up on them in your sparetime, etc., Google 'lilium virus' and 'lilium diseases' for illustrations and so on. It's not something a person learns overnite.

Thanks for the clarification, Lorn! I'm new to working with plants in general. I'm more used to working with animals and animal tissue. When culturing animal tissue even stem cells senesce, leading to cell lines that perform worse than cell lines produced from younger stem cells. The capacity of plant cells to regenerate is astounding!