Looking through the posts and topics on this forum, I have noticed that most everyone grows only Registered and Named Daylilies. Do any gardeners here grow some volunteers or hybrids that are not named or registered that you are quite fond of? If so, I'd love to see some photos!

I must confess, due to a limited gardening budget, I grow un-named daylily hybrids. I originally received seeds from some generous folks around the country. They had named daylilies which they cross-pollinated and shared some of their seeds with me. I neglected to keep track of the crossed pollen/pod names once they germinated and grew. I was given a variety of seeds and the challenge of keeping them all labeled and organized became more than I could handle. Not all did well here in the heat and dry sand of Florida. But many did! So I carried it all a step further (with the purpose to get more daylilies) by cross-pollinating those by hand to create possibly some more interesting blooms.

One of my favorites that I created by cross-pollinating by hand during Spring of last year is one that I fondly named "Sunset over Sebastian". I live in Sebastian, FL and the colors reminded me of many a local summer sunset. It caught my eye with it's very first bloom this year and continued to bloom for a month. The color blends were so vivid and appealing to MY eye.

So I was really curious if anyone else here also creates hybrids? Perhaps just for the fun of it, like me! I'd love to hear about it and see any photos of your creations!

Sunset over Sebastian:



For a few more of my hybrid daylilies (all un-named), I posted a slideshow on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...

Becky there is a smaller area in my garden where I grow a number of un-named daylilies some of them I grew from seeds and kept the best plants others I either purchased or received as a gift plant with an order. I keep thinking that sometime I may want to do some hybridizing using some of them so they will remain in the garden. Most of my garden has named registered daylilies.

Your daylily is lovely and it is great fun seeing seedlings bloom for the first time and then waiting until a year or two passes to see if the bloom changes and what the plant habits each plant displays. I encourage you to keep doing your hybridizing for your enjoyment. Here is the website of the AHS where you can find a lot of information on daylilies, clubs to join and gardens to visit in Florida. http://www.daylilies.org/ Here is the information on Florida http://www.daylilies.org/AHSre...

Where you live you can see your seedlings bloom much faster than we can in Minnesota due to our much colder climate. Enjoy and have fun with daylilies.

I don't grow them exclusively but I have gotten daylilies from nurseries that turned out to be the wrong cultivar and I have purchased clumps that have no names in order to increase my garden. I have 2 areas now, one for the named ones which is kind of a display garden with labeled daylilies and another which contains those unnamed beauties that I love also. You can't go wrong either way. I hope to do some hybridizing this next season and the only advantage I can see between the two is that the registered ones you might have more luck hybridizing because you probably will know if they are fertile or not.

I grow a lot of seedlings that I have hybridized myself. A lot I just can't seem to get rid of so I use them in hybridizing. Here are a couple.

Brigade of Butterflies Seedling



Hailey Henrion Memorial Seedling




(Trahlyta x Lake Norman Spider)




(Lavender Blue Baby x Starman's Quest)




(Sexy Sally x Stargate Portal)

Love those unique seedlings, Cindy.

Thanks!!!

Cindy they are lovely no wonder you are using them in your program.

Thanks Betty!!!

Yes, very pretty seedlings, Cindy. I have some unnamed that I received about 10 yrs ago from a generous dl collector. I didn't know about tagging them. Still pretty tho. I also have a few seedlings that I like but most I give away.

Cindy they are lovely. I grow about 20 that I bought when I first got into Daylilies that are not tagged and I have no idea what they are. This year giving some to neighbors and friends that just want the flowers and don't care about the names. It is hard to get rid of them because they are the ones that got me hooked.

Theresa - That's a great idea about having two gardens for your daylilies ... one for the registered named cultivars and one for the no-names!

Oh Cindy! Those are beautiful!!!! Wow!

Liz - Any photos of some of your un-named daylilies?

Do any of you (besides Cindy) do cross-pollinating by hand to create new hybrids? I will confess that I am a little obsessed with making hybrids by hand-pollinating with an artist's paint brush. Partly I do it to make more daylilies for my garden beds, but I also get such a kick out of what the blooms look like by selectively creating them. I've gotten some surprises, too!

Thanks Becky, Teresa & Liz!!!

Becky and Cindy, I love those pretty seedlings. This was my first year to have sdlgs bloom here. It was very interesting to say the least. I am planning a mass seed planting next February indoors. I am also going to try Steve Williams of O'Bannon Springs Daylilies (see article in "Great Lakes Daylily" journal spring 2013, pg12). He plants them outdoors after a couple good frost days in November. Very interesting article. He gets 70% germination.

Mike, I live close to Steve. I learned to plant seeds directly in the ground years and years ago, from Charles Applegate and Dottie Warrell. I usually prepare the soil in late summer, but I plant them after Thanksgiving. I don't refrigerate seeds after I harvest them for this method, I store them dry in little paper envelopes, letting them get all dry and shriveled up. Last time I planted seed was in fall 2011, and had over 90%, but I use very few evergreen parents. Curt Hanson direct seeds in fall, and I believe Steve Moldovan did too.

Becky, Sunset Over Sebastian is a gorgeous pink! That is one to be proud of, for sure.

Cindy, I love pink daylilies, so all of yours are right up my alley! My very favorite color is a peachy pink.

Although I have not hybridized anything, I do have about 20-30 NOID daylilies, mostly give to me by neighbors and friends, but maybe 10 or so seedling crosses from the daylily farm that used to be in the area. Here are a couple of my favorites.

This is a peachy-pink that I got from a friend.


The next two are seedlings from Lakeside Daylily Farm that I got during their last summer in business. As a matter of fact, their seedlings were always $5.00, so my first few years of going there, I bought several of their unnamed seedlings.




This one just thrills me every time I see it. I love it. Have no idea where I got it or the next one.


And last but not least, a very fragrant, hose-in-hose (I think???) double

Becky some photos as requested.

Nice yellow double Vickie!!!

Becky, Sunset over Sebastian is beautiful! Yyou should consider registering it. It doesn't cost much, and it would be fun! You don't have to sell it, but giving it a registered name would be very nice. And, you just may find people who would want to purchase it, which is a bonus. It doesn't matter that you don't know the names of the parents. Many registered daylilies have no parents listed. I only hybridize for myself, and haven't considered registering any, but I will do a few if I get some good ones. I want one to name after my Mom, and a dear friend has asked me to name one for her. So, I'll name at least two, but I have no plans to sell them. I had to leave all of my seedlings behind when I moved, all from crosses that I made myself, and I had been waiting 3 years for them to bloom for the first time. That was hard to do! But, I'll get a fresh start next Spring.

Thanks Cindy. I really like a couple of yours too. The fifth one (pink) and the ninth one (cream) are nice looking, but that last yellow one is super nice looking!

Natalie, I knew that you had moved, but how awful that you had to leave your seedlings behind
Three years is a long time to wait and then have to leave. Hopefully, next spring will reap rewards beyond your wildest dreams!

Well, I'll start hybridizing again next year, but I'll still have to wait to see what comes from it! Hopefully not 3 years next time!