Lilies and Related Plants - RHS Lily Group

Figure 10. The 4 th seedling to flower
was spidery.
Figure 11. Bulbs taken out of tissue
culture, trimmed and vernalized in
damp cedar chips.
less. The bulbs are up to 1 inch across, fragile, with scales poking out into harm’s
way. The scales are jointed in 1 to 3 locations and break off with little effort. Those
tiny bits of scale generate multiple bulblets when put back into tissue culture.
L . philadelphicum var. andinum has long and narrow seed pods which are quite
uniform while the hybrid seed pods are fatter and shorter and shape and size varies
from plant to plant. Like L . philadelphicum, these can set lots of good looking
small seeds with very little chaff although I only got a dozen or so seeds from one
pod. A couple of pods contained over 200 seeds.
A few final thoughts
I expect the F2 generation will produce a wider range of variation. F2 seed has
already been obtained and will be sent to the RHS and NALS seed exchanges this
year. This seed is the result of intercrossing the plants shown in the photos. I would
like to encourage others to grow these hybrids from seed and to share the resulting
plants and seeds with others to ensure long term survival of this material. The
seed should be easy to start if exposed to light and moisture. There is no need to
start seed in vitro but I would like to mention that the in vitro approach is a good
way to start the seed. This approach gives near 100% germination with few losses,
it gets plants past the juvenile stage where damp off and such can strike down the
seedlings, and plants initially grow faster than they would in soil. A full account of
this in vitro approach can be found in the June 1, 2011 issue of the North American
Lily Society Quarterly Bulletin (Vol 65, No. 2, page 19), the article is titled, An in
Vitro Germination Experiment with L . philadelphicum and L . philadelphicum ×
L . catesbaei. If anyone has additional questions about the hybrids or about growing
from seed, or comments in general, feel free to contact me at bfrncs@bepc.com.
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