I like the unusual thus the original purchase of Wigged Out . However , in my seedling bed this year I have several plants that have shown up looking like this and I am wondering why this phenomenon has happened . These seeds were not from hybridizing with Wigged Out . Actually I always assumed that hybridizing with that plant is impossible as no blooms are produced. These seeds were purchased from the Lily Auction, unfortunately the tags I used to id the crosses have disappeared (Thanks Mother Nature)

However, I do wonder if it is a common genetic mutation . I had never seen this mutation before I purchased and grew Wigged Out so I was really shocked to see daylilies in my seedling bed this year displaying these heads virtually identical to Wigged Out.




Wondering if anyone else has had this kind of anomoly come up in their seedling beds.

I have had a couple of seedlings proliferate instead of bloom but nothing like what you have

Were your seeds the same cross that produced Wigged Out?

According to the original description from Iron Gate Gardens 'Wigged Out' (WO) is able to produce flowers but extremely rarely. However, whether the flowers were fertile was not indicated. WO is presumably from Kropf breeding lines. My guess is that the mutation is present in those lines and that someone either accidentally repeated the cross that originally produced WO or made crosses using daylilies that were hybridized by Kropf or were derived from them.

Would you have planted all seeds from each purchased packet(s) in its own location? Would you be able to count how many seedlings from the same package had the characteristic and how many did not? That might give us an idea whether the characteristic is a simple recessive or its inheritance is more complicated.

Maurice, Yes I planted all the seeds from the one packet .....6 in total and I have 6 separate plants all displaying the same heads. So weird .

Dave , I get prolifs like what you have shown on some of my daylilies too. I am not very successful in getting them to root and grow though.

Six out of six is very very very unusual.

Is this the first year that each one of those seedlings have flowered?

I have to assume that the characteristic in 'Wigged Out' is genetic rather than environmental.

If the characteristic is caused by a single gene effect then for all practical purposes the characteristic could be "dominant" or "recessive". However, reasonably, for all six out of six seedlings to show the characteristic it would have to be inherited as a dominant. But then at least one of the parents would have to presumably show the characteristic. Then it would not only have to show the characteristic but it would also have to have flowered producing at least one normal fertile flower to be able to produce seeds or pollen.
As well, for the characteristic to be inherited as a dominant, it more or less would have had to first appear in 'Wigged Out' (WO) and to probably only be present in WO and seedlings produced from WO as a parent. I am assuming that no one will report seeing the same characteristic on any other daylily that is unrelated to WO or on any other daylily unrelated to Kropf breeding lines.