Hi. I'm jumping into lilies. I have one small lily currently, hoping to exapand, with small lilies.

I would like to learn more about Lilium formosanum var. formosanum (aka. Lilium formosanum var. pricei).

How to germinate? What temps/soil to germinate etc.? How hardy is it? I'd like to keep it in a 1, 2, or 3 gallon pot, or if not possible, in ground, (though I would like it in a pot just in case I need to move it). I'm in zone 7A/6B, we get humid, hot summers with plenty o' rain and sometimes droughts in early fall, cold, gloomy winters, mostly cloudy, (from recent weather changes), unreasonably unstable temps with random blizzards and sleet. How hardy will it be? Should I do winter protection? When it is still a seedling, can I keep it in 4inch, 5inch, 6inch pots, or should I keep it in a 7-8inchx3-feet large, ~8inch deep windowbox? What soil should I use? Any weird care tips I should know?

Sorry for the many questions, I just want to make sure I don't mess up with this wonderful plant :hogrin:

Much thanks,
Sedumzz

Dwarf formosanum is hardy species and I think your climate will be good for them. You just need to be sure they have excellent drainage especially in pots. How to grow them from seed?
Step 1: get seeds
Step 2: sow seeds in spring and put them in sheltered location with a lot of sunlight
Step 3: keep the soil moist (but do not overwater)
That's it. They are really easy from seeds and you might have 1st flowers after just one year.
They usually germinate 2-3 weeks after sowing.

Lucius93 said:
That's it. They are really easy from seeds and you might have 1st flowers after just one year.
They usually germinate 2-3 weeks after sowing.

Hi Luka, well I did exactly all the above. Now I have two separate pots of hair thin seedlings in a sheltered sunny spot. We are moving towards fall. How do you care for them for the first winter? When do you prick them apart?. Mine seem just too fragile yet. They were sown Nov 8 and emerged Jan 7. That is two months later. Of course I live in a cool summer part of the world, so everything takes a bit longer. For owerwintering I do have greenhouses ( heated and cool). Would you suggest moving them there? By the slow growth, mine do not look like that they will be ready for bloom year #1 but if I understood correctly they may reach acceptable size by year # 2 which is fine with me. Should I expect the initial leaf blade, yellow and die, while I wait for it to grow further foliage later? These are the natural follow questions beyond step 3. in advance. My various lily sowings, have had a fairly high success rate, so now I'm moving towards the initial first year growth care.

Arturo

You should have waited until early spring before sowing. During the winter they should be kept in a greenhouse in a warm and sunny place.

Yes. keep them warm, at least above freezing, but better to have them warmer and actually growing. I have no experience with the dwarf form, but the regular tall formosanum doesn't need a winter to continue growth ( although a winter is OK). Keep them in their original pots until they are crowding each other, or until your spring arrives. The larger bulbs that they have will translate to easier transplanting.

Lucius93 said: You should have waited until early spring before sowing. During the winter they should be kept in a greenhouse in a warm and sunny place.

@Lucius93 Thank you Luka
btw Nov 18 IS early spring down here in the southern hemisphere, when I sowed them!

Arturo

Leftwood said: Yes. keep them warm, at least above freezing, but better to have them warmer and actually growing. I have no experience with the dwarf form, but the regular tall formosanum doesn't need a winter to continue growth ( although a winter is OK). Keep them in their original pots until they are crowding each other, or until your spring arrives. The larger bulbs that they have will translate to easier transplanting.

very much! I will place them in the warm greenhouse once cool ( not cold) weather sets in , perhaps by late march. I can keep them growing all winter long and yes wait until bulblets overcrowd the initial pot. Then perhaps add some dilute fertilizer to stimulate growth?
Would this also be the case for the rest of my seedlings? I have another pot of pardalinumxkellogii cross from Steve2020 seeds that have lovely single blades. These days some trumpet seeds also from Steve are emerging. So common sense would indicate give them warm treatment to all. Can I go wrong with any by doing so?
What about offsets showing up at the base of spent bloomed stalks?. Would you also treat them as seedlings. Since I do also have a cool greenhouse with temps ocasionally dropping to -1ºC in mid winter/early spring, they could get enough cold without danger of the soil freezing. I really do not understand how sensitive to frost are these first blades
Arturo

Ah yes...you're right. It's spring time in November (S. Hemisphere).

Adding some dilute fertilizer for formosanum is good. I am thinking your pardalinum x kelloggii cross will like the cool greenhouse that stays at or above freezing, and they will still grow slowly. But @Steve2020 will know best.

Your trumpet seedlings can also be kept growing like formosanum, but its not mandatory. Just know that if the trumpets naturally die back (if they didn't like transplanting, for instance), they will need a cold conditioning to get them to sprout again. So your options would be to (1)keep them growing all through your winter, or (2) keep them growing in the warm greenhouse for an extra 1-1.5 months and then to the cold for the rest of the winter, to come up again at your normal spring time outside.

Treat your offsets like you would the mother plant. Even frozen soil won't hurt them. The leaves might wither, but that's ok.

Usually the first cotyledon from the seed ( or the first leaf from the seed bulb[as with pard. x kelloggii]) is actually a bit more cold hardy than the leaves that come after. Even so, none of the lilies we talk about here have leaves that will be frozen off by minus 1C.

@Leftwood Rick for all your comments. Everything is gradually being sorted out.
<Treat your offsets like you would the mother plant. Even frozen soil won't hurt them. The leaves might wither, but that's ok.>
My final question: All of my bulbs and offsets are from pretreated northern hemisphere source. So this almost finished season, what I've been doing is getting them to switch to our southern conditions. Each cultivar behaved differently but still I have a fairly wide assortment. They are kept inside grow bags above ground. If I dug a hole and stuck the grow bag inside it at the same level, if I understood correctly, then near surface soil may freeze when outside temps drop to -º5C/-º6 in late winter, but bulbs are planted deeper so they would still be below beyond the freezing level line ( about 2" inches deep or so.). On the contrary if I left the bag fully above ground then the whole bag would freeze. Would that be detrimental ? Thank you.

Arturo

Hello Arturo - I'm glad that the seeds are doing well with you. I agree with Rick's advice. How warm is your heated greenhouse? I have one that I keep above 5.5C/42F. You can keep the formosanum at these temperatures and they will continue growing slowly. I think they will be fine with this. My L. formosanum var. pricei seem to be doing fine in my greenhouse from a September 2021 sowing. They are still in the flats they were sown in and I will pot them on shortly as Spring arrives (but we had 2" snow overnight and temps are going down to 23F/-5C tomorrow night, so we are not there yet). The L. pardalinum x kelloggii should do fine in the cool greenhouse. They won't mind a bit of frost. I think you just need to be a little careful on the watering they get, depending on how free-draining the compost is. Don't overwater them when they are dormant, but I expect you are aware of this from all the other plants you have grown.

As for your bulbs in growbags, then Rick and others who live in areas that are quite a bit colder than -º5C/-º6 in late winter might be better-placed to reply. How many growbags do you have, and how easy is it for you to dig a trench for them? While the bulbs in growbags might be Ok at these winter temperatures, I know it has taken quite a bit of effort on your part to get the bulbs to Argentina, so you may want to err on the side a caution during their first winter. Can you put the growbags in your cold greenhouse for the coldest month? I don't know what options you have for protecting the growbags if they are left on the surface. Any kind of mulch or tarpaulin covering might help if they were left out in the open. Is cold often associated with snow with you? If it snows then turns cold, which is often the case here, then the snow covering does help insulate the ground from the cold temperatures. But here the cold only lasts 5 days or so before a new low-pressure front from the Pacific brings rain and above-freezing temperatures. So my cold periods are short-lived, unlike those of Minnesota.

Hope this helps for now. Will write again later. Best regards, Steve

As long as your bag above ground has been acclimated there, freezing down to -3C shouldn't hurt the bulbs. By acclimated, I mean that the bag can't be in a warm place, like your warm greenhouse, and then put in a freezing condition. The bulbs in the bag must have time to get used to the cold before it gets very cold. They must be acclimated for at least 3 weeks. This is for the more cold hardy bulbs that you have. I would exclude the western North American lilies (WNAs) and bury them in the ground as you mention. And obviously, there are other lilies that naturally won't take so much cold.

But if something went wrong, like a rainstorm just before the extreme cold, etc., survival could be in jeopardy. So really, it would be safer and less stressful for the bulbs if you buried them all in the soil.

The Dutch routinely store their bulbs for sale at about -10C, but that is under perfect conditions. This very low temperature can be good for storage, but it will not pretreat a bulb. That takes place with a warmer, but cold temp. It is likely that all your bought pretreated bulbs were stored at some time at those very low temps.

Hello everyone, @Steve2020 and @Leftwood Right now all my bought bulbs and their offsets are sitting in their large grow bags with good garden soil and with very good drainage. A few of these I already dug a hole and they did their growth with the bag sunken. This was done so that late spring winds wouldn't topple them over . They are placed in a sheltered position under the "eaves" of a line of cypresses, so even if it freezes, the ground there takes a bit longer to freeze deep. The line, with an eastward facing aspect, is long enough so as to harbour and bury the rest of my above ground bags one next to each other. Deeper under ( where the bulbs are sitting) I doub't that temps will drop much less than -º1 C, even if ambient temps drop to -º6 C. Yes, it will imply some work, I have to count them but there are probably about 30 bags to bury. So in the course of the next 3/4 weeks I can get that done without stressing myself.
Because all my bulbs were pretreated, their first season performance was very weird. One of the same kind bloomed, the other did so, two months later. One never showed up and rotted, the other bloomed nicely early summer . These , of a first batch of 28 varieties, were placed in my warm greenhouse during all winter and showed this array of growth. In spring once the danger of frost was over ( here it is end of November) I placed them outside in that sheltered position. So of this initial purchase I did have losses but also many that grew nicely, but with no blooms. I would expect these to have healthy bulbs underneath, and with season's clock adapted/reverted.
Then I got a second batch in late spring ( early November). This group fared poorly. Although growing with no temp damage, only half of them ever showed sprouts, and of these about 5 different varieties are finishing their blooms just now. I'm missing a trial with bulbs bought mid-winter and grown inside the warm greenhouse. From watching their behaviour inside my house, a week after arrival all bulbs show their center sprout, so they ought to be placed inside a bag or in the ground in the warm greenhouse. Since the area in the greenhouse ,I share it with our veggies commercial venture ,I can use it only as transient space thus the grow bag strategy. I witnessed lack of elongation of the main stem of many of the varieties I bought during the short winter days. Things began to change after days started to lengthen as of August 15 onwards. So apart from temperature, I should take that in account so as to best adjust when to purchase these bulbs. Whatever is being offered is targetted at the cut flower trade which is grown commercially way up north with none of these issues at stake. So Steve, you are correct, about how complex it is to find adapted bulbs on sale. That means I can buy bulbs any time but will they adapt here in the south is a different issue! So thanks to everyone up there that has experience with lilies I'm figuring out how to sequence every step. Bulbs are not very pricey, so I can afford spending taking into account all of these handicaps. If I were later to offer these adapted bulbs for sale here I will need to take this added cost into account. My first estimate is that about 50% of a buy will make it through. I keep notes of which fared how. I admit that the vendor will not give me inhouse info of how long have their bulbs been stored and in what exact conditions so I have to take what I'm given or leave them. I'm way too far south of their regular market. I'm taking the risks...
Of course bulbs raised from seed, have none of these issues, but it takes quite a long time before I see a flower. Meanwhile like anyone in the gardening world I need the stimulus of a gorgeous lily hybrid with a heavenly fragrance to boldly stare at my face! That makes up for the losses and miscalculations Mine are mainly, Orientals and Orientpets, a few Longiflorum hybrids and one or two Asiatics. Up to here all in all, I must say again to everyone, because I did manage to get them through this adaptation process fairly well. That is why I want to ensure their winter survival. If they do so, I'll know it next spring, when natural sprout emergence occurrs. Then by march 2023 I'll find a spot in the ground in my general garden space a leave them alone, hoping to enjoy their beauty for years to come...

Arturo

Sounds like you have things well thought out, Arturo. You have good plans.

Lack of elongation of the stem is almost always caused by the plant wanting to grow faster than the nutrient source will allow. This usually means there aren't enough functioning roots to support normal growth. Most often, this can happen when a bulb is pretreated and it is is ready to grow. Normally, the bulb will grow roots first, while it prepares to send up a sprout. Then it sends up the sprout. But what if, for whatever reason, roots don't grow sufficiently? The bulb still continues to prepare for sprouting. If too much time elapses at the right temperature, the bulb will decided to sprout, regardless of the amount of roots it has. Rather than just growing very slowly, the growth pattern is very different. The sprout often looks almost like a mature plant in miniature, a short thick stem with lots of little leaves, and often flower buds.

Ultimately, the solution is time. It's a phenomenon with newly planted bulbs that corrects itself in the following growing season. But most importantly, if the stunted plant has flower buds, be sure to remove them as early as you are able. The plant is already struggling from lack of energy, and the flower buds are sapping what little energy there is, at the expense of normal growth of every other part of the plant.

Flowers and flower buds (and seed development later) are very strong energy sinks. In the case above, if you remove the flower bud(s) early enough in development - small enough to need a fingernail scissors to accomplish, you will often find that the remaining plant jumps into growth.

N.B. The other cause of lack of stem elongation is virus.

@Leftwood, Rick for the above and all multiple previous posts that have clarified my journey!
If I understood correctly, then with pre-treated bulbs my best bet would be to purchase bulbs in mid winter here ( that is end of July/August); plant them in grow bags with good draining soil; place the grow bags in the cool greenhouse so as to delay sprout emergence but enough warmth to stimulate bulb root development ( the cool greenhouse might drop to -1ºC in the atmosphere but the soil in the bags would never freeze). Let emergence inside shift as close as possible towards outdoor natural emergence timing and when fully grown and outdoor temps are beyond frost place them in my sheltered corner for their first two seasons, burying my bags during their first outdoor winter.

Arturo

I don't think it matters that much. It shouldn't matter how long they are stored frozen; what matters is how long and what conditions it has been after that storage period. I don't see how you could ever get straight answers from the vendor(s), so I think it's a crap shoot, when you buy.

But logically, I think you are right, that your winter is the best time for your shipments.

-- Bulbs we buy in our winter/spring are dug in the previous late summer/fall and pretreated.
-- Bulbs available in our early summer/summer are just leftovers from these same pretreated bulbs dug in the previous late summer/fall.
-- Bulbs we buy in our fall are the freshest, dug within the last zero to two months and not pretreated.

So theoretically, the freshest pretreated bulbs are available for our late winter/spring shipment, and your fall/winter shipment. Add to that extra shipping time, and you get winter shipment for the southern hemisphere.

Is this what lulu formanusum car formanusum seeds look like?

My brother may have opened the package and dumped the seeds out…



One big seedling, w small ones

Maybe this is why there ar eso many…. At first I thought they were pine trees, but didn't pull any out

Yes, that's a lulu seed, LOL. The other look like Lilium also, although without seeing the actual seed coat (as in the first pic), I can't be positive. Many other monocot seedlings look like that, too. As to whether it is formosanum, only you would know. Most lily species don't have seed characteristics that define them enough to identify to the species level.

Leftwood said: Yes, that's a lulu seed, LOL. The other look like Lilium also, although without seeing the actual seed coat (as in the first pic), I can't be positive. Many other monocot seedlings look like that, too. As to whether it is formosanum, only you would know. Most lily species don't have seed characteristics that define them enough to identify to the species level.

Yes , formanosum var. pricei seeds were supposed to come. So, i can only assume this is it, because the only current lily plant I have other than this is on the other side of the house

When should I transplant these , and how?