Because I live on an east coast barrier island, foliage stays wet until 9 or 10 most mornings due to high humidity and droplets of ocean water when the surf is heavy. Yes, rust is a problem, but right now, most plants look good. Many that had rust are surrounded with dead leaves that I clean up routinely. I have begun to spray again, but it seems obscene to spray for rust in January.

florange said:Because I live on an east coast barrier island, foliage stays wet until 9 or 10 most mornings due to high humidity and droplets of ocean water when the surf is heavy. Yes, rust is a problem, but right now, most plants look good. Many that had rust are surrounded with dead leaves that I clean up routinely. I have begun to spray again, but it seems obscene to spray for rust in January.

I keep watching for rust, but I haven't been able to really determine if there has been any. It's certainly warm enough here, but it tends toward low humidity with lots of wind combined with high temps. That may be preventing it from doing a lot here. The scorching summer heat does it lieu of rust, I think. Some plants nearly disappear after blooming. However, the fans grow back after looking miserable. By the time the cooler weather returns in late Sept., the plants are growing and looking fairly nice. It was so wet this year I thought sure I'd see it, but if it was there I wasn't able to identify it.

I swear, I cringe every time I see rust, and that image of yours, Sue, makes my skin crawl. Handling rusty foliage makes me feel so... unclean... as though *I* am going to get rust, even through the gloves.

We've been having rain here, which is great for our reservoirs and environment (CA needs it so badly), but rain here always causes the rust to flourish. I had a few minutes to clean up the daylilies the other day (there was a short break in the rain), and I noticed that 'Coyote Moon' has got rust, again. It had been clean since I did my last rust purge early last year. I have to remind myself that I am keeping it as a rust source to test the seedlings with. (Not that I don't have other sources of rust... )

beckygardener said:I'd read that rust often shows when daylilies are acquired from nurseries in the south not long after being sent and transplanted.

With Maryott's, I checked and quite of few of THEIR cultivars use some rust susceptible daylily in the pedigree. Which is one of the reasons I didn't buy one of theirs. I was tempted but knew what would happen growing them here in Florida. So that makes me wonder if because of that, they do grow quite a few daylilies that are prone to rust. For the rust to show up not long after receiving and transplanting, apparently whatever they treat them with to control the rust has worn off. So even with the chemical treatments they are doing, rust is alive and well at many southern daylily nurseries despite their rust treatment program.

To be honest, that doesn't deter me all that much, it just makes me more determined to create some rust resistant hybrids from some of those pretty faces crossed with some highly rust resistant daylily cultivars. It's a challenge that is calling my name! But wouldn't it be nice to have some of these pretty faces already be rust resistant? I don't quite get why some southern hybridizers don't breed for rust resistance. Wouldn't that make sense? I am sure some do, but I have no idea which hybridizers.

It is possible, though not as likely, to get a rust resistant/tolerant plant from 2 rusty parents.
"Montserrat" is an example if "Good rust resistance" rating given by the hybridizer is indeed so.
When checking backgrounds, however, I also avoid those plants with too many susceptible relatives.

Perhaps those hybridizing for a particular look just don't care about rust--getting "the look" is job 1.
And "the look" is where the money seems to be. A fancy flower is introduced to "ohs" and "ahs".
Who gets excited about a plainer, but rust-resistant plant?

Some hybridizers just put out stronger plants than others.
While I haven't been hybridizing long, there is work by others that I seek, or not.

The whole rust issue shouldn't be something just left to be solved by concerned small growers,
although any effort in that direction is to be admired and encouraged.

Pat - Well, I agree. I keep my eyes on rust resistant daylily reports. I've added quite a few rust resistant registered cultivars to my garden for using as hybrid parents. I want the pretty face, but I also want the rust resistance ..... so I have resorted to growing both and then crossing. From most daylilies, I get a generous share of seeds, so I plan to grow out those seedlings and see which ones show resistance. Then possibly backcross them to rust resistant parents. And pick from those. And use those as my parent seedlings. It will take some time to establish my own "line" of daylilies to use when hybridizing. I just hope I am alive to enjoy some success. Being a small lot gardener, I don't have the land to grow a LOT of seedlings, so it is always a challenge. BUT .... as a hyrbidizer here on this forum said, he culls heavily and keeps just a few after 2 seasons. I think I am going to try my best to take his advice!

[quote="florange"]Because I live on an east coast barrier island, foliage stays wet until 9 or 10 most mornings due to high humidity and droplets of ocean water when the surf is heavy.

Hi Arlene
do you think the salty vapour landing on the leaves has any effect on the rust?
Does it burn the leaves?

No, but it really keeps the leaves wet for a long time. That encourages rust.

Daylilies are quite salt tolerant. Pat Stamile told me that when he lived in New York, his plants would flood with salt water and they were never damaged. I'm not on the beach, just in the middle of the barrier island, 150 ft from the beach. We don't get real salt spray, but we do get salt mist. Doesn't seem to bother the plants.

We had a slight freeze here last night in Florida zone 9a.

I plan to cut back all plants when time appears "right" and spray for any rust.
Any seedlings that show rust after that will be eliminated.

(If I don't see them bloom, I won't be tempted to fall in love with a rusty plant.)

Xenacrockett,
What will you use to spay them with?

Granted that I am not a hybridized, just play around with crosses. But rust is one of the last things I worry about, or look into when I am making crosses, because I live in the north, and it's not a big issue for me. Sure I have had rust a couple of times over the years, in the fall, and brought in by purchases. But the cold kills it off and I don't see it for years.

When I make crosses, I am more concerned about northern hardiness, looks, and flower numbers - not rust resistance. I am sure that many hybridizes in the north might feel the same way as me, because it is not as much of an issue.

I am glad for the heads up though, perhaps in the future I will make crosses with an eye towards rust resistance, but I can't promise that I will. Sadly, for me, it's low on my list. You can bet I would change my focus if it was a problem.

In fact, I am one of the few folks around, that was anxious for a decent cold snap. Not that I minded our long mild fall - it was great. But I surely don't mind these frigid temps right now.

I can understand a northern hybridizer's concern with northern hardiness and number of flowers (and northern rebloom). I can understanding wanting good looks, too; don't we all want beautiful flowers?

I don't live in the South, so rust also isn't that much of an issue for me... usually... but it has been enough of an issue that I have tossed a lot of plants, some with quite beautiful faces. My idea of garden beauty includes beautiful foliage, and rust is in direction opposition to such a thing. We look at the blooms for at most two-three months of the year, if we are lucky. But we look at the foliage for at least half of the year, and in some cases all of the year. It had better look good - no excuses. And it had better look good without the use of chemicals to do so.

So right now my own pollen dabbing endeavors, small as they are, try to take into account the foliage, which means that I have to at least attempt to hybridize in the direction of rust resistance. Are the blooms on my seedlings drop-dead beautiful with extreme ruffling and color patterns? No. But the flowers on most of the "keep-for-another-look" seedlings are nice enough (as garden plants), and I seem to have maybe acquired some degree of rust resistance. (In our climate, it is going to take more than a rainy season or two to evaluate that.) With decent foliage and an acceptable flower in hand, I then want to acquire (or re-acquire) other plant traits - CMO, EMO, budcount, branching, rebloom. If I get all of those, then comes the pretty face; but with all of those good traits with an acceptable face (and my idea of an acceptable face does not include starkly plain or ugly blooms), I'd say that I'd probably already have quite a good garden plant.

As the saying goes, it is easier to put a pretty face on a plant with good plant traits, then vice versa. I guess I will find out.

Like Jan, I am not as concerned with rust resistance because of the obvious reasons, I barely get rust. Also, without rust resistance ratings (which are finally being looked at on daylilies), one would not know when hybridzing which ones are resistant or not. If they don't have a rust rating then you cannot very well breed for rust resistance. Bud count is important to me and I will not keep a seedling under a 15 bud count, unless it is exceptional and I think I may be able to use it as a bridge plant with a cultivar with a lot higher bud count.

I suppose a trial program could be worked out with other hybridizers so that northern growers could ship a few of their plants to the south to check rust resistance, and the southern growers could reciprocate by sending some of their new intro plants up north to have them grown and checked for cold hardiness.

Larry - I think some hybridizes do that but for those that don't, it is a good idea!

If I ever create any worthy seedlings, I already have several folks in mind for sharing some fans for such an evaluation. And I am always game to grow northern bred cultivars here to evaluate for heat hardiness and rust resistance.

Seedfork said:Xenacrockett,
What will you use to spay them with?

I'm going to cut back, remove all cut foliage from the property,
and then spray with 4 oz. Green Magic per gallon.

Also will add soil minerals via Azomite or seaweed to make plants stronger.

Can we please get back to which daylilies are showing rust for you? That was the topic and the reason I started reading this. I am very interested in the side trail about rust but should it be in this thread?

Thanks!

Right now, 'Coyote Moon'... but not too badly (at least, not at the moment). With all of the recent rain, and warmer temps, I can think of several others that may shortly start showing rust.

"Just Fabulous" with lines going to "Gavin Petit" is a good ruster.

Seems to get somewhat better though the longer it is left in place and not disturbed.

My KNIGHTS IN WHITE SATIN has u-spores along the scape, which is a shame as I think my criteria for not growing a cultivar may be just that. Likewise STEVE TRIMMER which I don't find beautiful, but it flowers well. At least leaves can be ripped off so their spores don't infect others. But no point in growing a scape that you want to pull out. Our weather is A1 for rust proliferation. But until yesterday we had a spell of hot dry windy weather. Even PICCADILY PRINCESS and JEDI SUE MACORD which are very rusty in my garden, have looked almost rust free after my pulling off lots of leaves.

Some day when the plants are all strong enough to reshoot I intend, like Pat, to cut off all green foliage . Some of mine are still in the survival stage due to moving and not being able to dig enough ground. The foliage on GREEN MYSTIQUE looks bad but it needs some conditions. MILDRED MITCHELL shows spores constantly so gets lots of leaves ripped off. But it is still in a pot which is not a fair test.

Some that looked terrible when in pots are showing more resistance now they are growing strongly in the ground. I keep seeing more that have the brown black resistance marks. So when the 'cut off all green' (coag) time comes I will inspect and if any show rust on new leaves, I will keep taking those leaves off and if the plant dies, I won't replace it. Not something one could do with hundreds of plants. Spraying isn't practical here as always some wind coming up or down the valley.

Bron, if you do want to treat with fungicides but spraying isn't practical, have you thought of trying a soil drench instead of spraying? A study found it was effective against daylily rust for quite a long period of time (with a specific systemic fungicide - I don't know if your product label there allows that use).

If you're seeing brown-black on the leaves, might it be the formation of telia (teliospores, the winter spores, as opposed to urediniospores, the summer spores)?