Scottish Rock Garden Club Forum
Seedy Subjects! => Grow From Seed => Topic started by: David Nicholson on April 27, 2007, 07:20:37 PM
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Amongst the seed Maggi sent to me when I first joined SRGC last year was some Lilium regale. I sowed some of these on 30 June last year and the first picture below shows the progress made so far. I presume I need to keep them well fed but will I need to re-pot them in Autumn when the top growth has died back please? Should I pot the bulbs in separate pots of would having company suit them best?
The second picture shows another batch of the same seed sown 15 January this year.
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David, you are doing well with these. Why not plant out the whole pot of the first batch en masse into the garden and let them make a clump in situ?
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Maggi, OK will do. I may have a Lilium oxypetalum just showing above the grit-but then again it could be a weed!!
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That's a fine looking seedling.
I sowed some regale seeds in Spring 2005, I entertained hopes some would flower in 2006, instead they spent the year making more small bulbs.
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Mine have been well fed with the finest 'magic white powder' as recommended by our own BD.
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Mine have been well fed with the finest 'magic white powder' as recommended by our own BD.
I guess that is 'sulphate of potash', I'll try that.
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I thought David was referring to cocaine but I wasn't convinced that the BD would be in to that. ;D
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The BD takes the occasional cup of hot chocolate, Lesley, but that is brown powder!
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Maggi the "brown powder" is also a nickname for unrefined heroine so from bad to worse I would say or maybe from colera to pest as the saying is in Sweden.
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In case MI5 (the British Secret Service) is reading these posts, and it still operates in Scotland!, I really did mean Sulphate of Potash. I had no intention of meaning any other substances, particularly those loved by musicians, actors, footballers, and other persons of more than adequate financial means,and not normally used by gardeners or Bulb Despots. Honest Guv. ;D
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OOps! we did it again! Perhaps we could plead mitigating circumstances... stupidity ? Of course, as a rhododendron lover, it is easy for me to promise to turn over a new leaf... we turn over every leaf !
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That's a fine looking seedling.
I sowed some regale seeds in Spring 2005, I entertained hopes some would flower in 2006, instead they spent the year making more small bulbs.
Postscript, there are quite a few buds. Seed to flowers in two years.
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On that basis I should be due some flowers next year!
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I read that Lilium Formosanum is quickest to flower from seed. Here are three pots of seeds sown on my office window sill around Christmas
The one on the left is Formosanum SRGC seed exchange seed, the middle bought Formosanum seed (not as good), and the right one seed collected from an unknown lilly in the garden. My money is on the last one to flower first.
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Would anyone like very fresh seeds of Lilium formosanum v. pricei? Mine are just opening pods now. A long and elegant, slim trumpet, the kind that (I'm told, and I've seen in paintings) angels blow.There's masses of seed. email privately if you'd like some. Delicious perfume too, about 30cms high, flowering late summer.
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Lesley, can you let me know if you got my email? I sent one to you, but it is not appearing in "My Messages".
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Yes thanks Gene, it arrived all right. As a New Personal Message, rather than as a topic reply.
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Would anyone like very fresh seeds of Lilium formosanum v. pricei?
Below is a photo of the plants I got from Lesley's seed, sown 30th May 2007, first one flowered 21st. July 2008. They are in a 5" high pot.
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Well done David, you beat me to flowering size. I planted my seedlings in the garden last year and it looks as though they might flower next year.
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As David N says, well done David. Mine never flower so quickly. Do you have several in the pot? It is looking like a well-established clump rather than a single seedling, especially with multiple stems. Bet it smells nice too. :)
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Thanks, David and Lesley.
Four seeds germinated at once in 2007 and I put them all in a 2" pot and then potted that on. Three survived and you can see in the photo there's one flower and two buds.
Yes there is a nice smell in the greenhouse where this pot lives. I think it is a really nice plant. I'd been put off var. pricei before because some of the pictures show a big flower emerging at ground level but the current dimensions are just right.
14 months from Lily seed to flower is not that good, I've seen 8 months quoted.
It doesn't always go right. I posted a picture of three pots of seedlings to this topic last year. The bought seed fizzled out, the seedex ones are mostly still alive but still small. The "unknown" ones grew very big very fast, there's no doubt they would have flowered this year, but direct sunlight or serious wind outdoors killed the foliage.
Finally David, I hope your L. Regale seedling which started this thread is prospering.
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These postings of things flowering so quickly are REALLY depressing!! ::) When I think how much longer things take to flower for me (partly because of neglect at times, and partly because of conditions here) I almost throw my hands up in disgust. :o Almost!! ;) ;D Doesn't stop me from trying though.... it just takes a little longer here. :)
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Paul, I don't think I've ever had L.f var p flower in less than 30 months.
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Lesley,
Well that is some comfort! ;D 8 Months just sounds stupendous. What sort of conditions would push them through that quickly? :o
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Hi Paul et al,
I used to grow the "type" form of Lilium formosanum and it would flower in 9 nine months from seed regardless of the season! Theoretically you could have them in flower all the year if you started off new seedlings every month! However that was when I lived in "good ol' frost free Melbyn" and I've had little success with the species out here - they actually need a bit of looking after and don't just grow like weeds! (The original bulb I started with was a "feral" my dad dug up along the roadside - in Gippsland, I think, it was over 30 years ago!)
cheers
fermi
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Can't imagine what conditions Paul. Maybe someone pushing hard from the other side of the world. :)
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8 Months just sounds stupendous. What sort of conditions would push them through that quickly?
Self-seeded ones do that for me, but our growing season is both quite long and cool and mild. Later germinating ones try to (and sometimes succeed in) flower in mid-winter in the open garden.
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I've now collected seed from the lilium formosanum v. pricei grown from the seed Lesley offered above, if you'd like some email me.
I've also got lilium regale seed to give away.
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I can't resist updating this thread. There's another picture below of the pot of three seeds from Lesley Cox that germinated in 2007, it made a really nice clump of about 12 flowers this year.
My L. formosanum seed from the 2006/2007 and 2007/2008 seed ex. also flowered recently, it was interesting that these lilies did not have the same strong scent and had yellow rather than brown pollen.
The second picture is the result of "right hand pot" which I posted on May 21, 2007. Sunshine killed many of these lilies last year, but the survivors have flowered. They look and smell much like the parent lily. Reading McRae's book on lilies one would not expect these to be self fertile or to come anything like true. Such considerations would put me off donating seed from these, pity when they're so easy and results are so good.
Finally L. Henryi, from seed ex. 2007/2008, seemingly another lily that will flower in 18 months from seed.
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That's beautiful David, better than mine which are still mostly in nursery pots. I must get a bunch planted out.