Breathe deeply. Again. Again. It's going to be alright for you. Me ... I'm the one who has to worry! I live in 9a/b.

Me, too!

sooby said:I agree with Pat that seedlings are unlikely to die from rust, although I haven't heard anybody say that seedlings are less resistant before. Is this from your personal observation, Pat?

Yes, the little guys tend to get rust quickly on the first exposure here in zone 90a.
I do have one garden that seems to encourage rust, and another that doesn't get it much at all.
(Naturally seedlings are in the rust-prone garden)

I'll be weeding out seedlings that are rust prone,
but will attempt to clear them of rust first and then whoever gets it is out.
Rust is a real chore to manage -- a real pain.

I always buy my plants from Southern gardens due to the fact that I am in the south and they can ship their plants early, early Spring (1st of March) and can also ship their plants in late fall (last of October). All gardens that sell plants in the south (below the Mason-Dixie line) will more than lightly have rust. Unless they over-winter with degrees constantly in the lower 30's and have ice, sleet, snow covering their plants or if their plants are all dormant, there is no way you cannot get rust. It just takes the right conditions (rain, heavy dew, low temps) and you have a very good chance of having rust. Even if you isolate the plants, if you live in zone 8 (a,b), 9(a,b) and below you will have this terrible disease of your plant. I spray in the spring keeping it at bay, then when the temps reach in the high 90's to 100's guess what, rust doesn't grow anymore. It rears its ugly head again in the fall (Sept/Oct/Nov) and you spray again throughout the winter. The commercial gardens to stay in business have to spray and be inspected. At the time they ship, the plants don't exhibit any rust and if you live way up in the upper zones you probably won't have to worry after your winter of it coming back.

sooby said:I agree with Pat that seedlings are unlikely to die from rust, although I haven't heard anybody say that seedlings are less resistant before. Is this from your personal observation, Pat?

Yes, seedlings seem more susceptible to rust when they are just starting out.

After they have been treated, they seem to be more resistant as they get older.
I've had some that looked really bad turn out to be respectable adults that were somewhat resistant.

Interesting Pat. In other plants their rust resistance can change from seedling to adult plant but that hasn't been formally looked into for daylily rust as far as I know. It probaby won't be since it's not as big a deal as it could be for annual agricultural crops because for the most part people are growing only adult daylilies, except for hybridizers. What it does suggest, though, is that maybe a susceptible seedling shouldn't be written off too soon!

Pat - thank you for your post. In the back of my mind, that thought has crossed my mine several times.

My contribution to the seedlings-and-rust conversation... and fwiw I live in zone 9b.

I had a couple of flats of seedlings (jammed several per 4" pot) sitting in my side yard last winter (2014-2015). When I went to start potting them up in January, I found that pretty much all of them had been infected with rust. (Last winter I ended up purging quite a few potted named cultivars from that area, due to heavy rust. I had bought several new plants that year, so I don't have much doubt as to where the rust came from.)

I pitched some of the seedlings that were the most heavily affected (those were from crosses with rust-susceptible near-white tets), but pulled a few leaves and kept most of them and eventually planted them out. (I decided to build a new seedling bed instead of potting them up, and for one reason or another it took until November to get them all planted out. )

We have had quite a bit of rain here the past few months, and while some established cultivars here currently show some rust (there are a few rust buckets I am keeping for various reasons), the seedling bed thus far looks pretty clean. The only sketchy looking seedlings (no pustule eruption, yet, just suspicious looking yellow areas on the foliage) are those from the near-white tet crosses, and that is to be expected. (My pollen dabbing in that vein is to get some near-white tets that do have resistance.)

Since many of the other seedlings come from 'Hip To Be Square' (I read somewhere or another that it was considered rust resistant and for the most part it is here, though it too got some rust that awful winter (it lives in that same side yard that had the horrifyingly ultra heavy rust density that year)), I have some hopes that the mature, blooming size plants will also show some resistance. (I also have hopes that said plants will also be polymerous, but that's another matter. I am hoping it is not to much to ask for polymerous + rust resistant in the same plant(s)... )

sooby said: What it does suggest, though, is that maybe a susceptible seedling shouldn't be written off too soon!

Oh no.

I take it you ditched some daylilies, Glen?

Maybe it is good that I am sentimental about my seedlings. Otherwise, most of my seedlings would have been trashed. Instead, my "surviving" seedlings are becoming the strongest plants (seedlings only, not counting registered plants) and some are even showing less rust infections. So I think my yard, climate, and growing conditions alone will weed out a LOT of mine. THAT situation can be ruthless during summer in central Florida.

We have a little experience. When we were collecting daylilies from lots of different sources, we found a couple of potted plants at a local nursery and bought them. They looked very good, but in a short time planted in our garden they became infested with rust and it spread all over the garden. I dug the two DL's that started the problem and moved them to an isolated area. I got some spray and treated the beds. A couple of sprayings about a week apart got it all under control. We buy DL's from lots of sources both spring and fall and have never had another problem. Rust does not survive our winters. I have talked to many people in our area and all the daylily collectors have had a similar experience at least one time. We had lots of first year seedlings the year we got rust and the seedlings were no worse than the registered cultivars. Lots of the seedlings were affected very little.

There are two ways of looking at the difference between young seedlings and adult plants for resistance. One is a general overall comparison between a whole seedling bed compared to a whole adult plant bed. The other is a comparison between the resistance of an individual seedling, and the resistance of that same seedling when it has become an adult plant. The interesting thing would be the latter, if there actually is a difference. Such comparisons can be totally confounded, though, because of the total dependence of rust on environmental conditions.

For example, say a seedling bed is overcrowded, gets more shade, gets irrigated more often and so forth compared to adult plant bed. In that case you may see a difference just because of that because environmental conditions influence the severity of the rust. The same may even apply to the individual seedling. So what you would need to do for the latter is rate it while it is still growing in the same spot. As soon as you change the environment you potentially also change the severity of the rust. You may line out the seedlings with more space than they had between them in the seedling bed and that could influence the amount of rust. There is also the difference from year to year. If the seedling's first year is a year where the weather or other conditions are conducive to rust, but the next year is not, it may appear that the seedling has become more resistant.

That's not to say there can't be a difference between seedling and adult plant resistance because it does occur in other plant rusts. But we also have to take into account other influences. The amount of rust is dependent on the environment and even the most susceptible cultivar will not get much if conditions are not conducive to rust. You could totally slather a highly susceptible cultivar with rust spores but if you keep it in a dry environment, for example, it won't get rust.

I'm brand new to daylilies and my orders have not arrived yet, but just in case I may encounter the rust problem later, what kind of spray should I get ?

Thanks and have a wonderful Sunday !

It would depend on your budget, how bad the rust is in your garden, and to what extent you want to control it. Some people do nothing, some just want to keep the plants from looking too bad, and for some it is all out war If you use a systemic fungicide you should rotate it with a contact fungicide so that you don't become ground zero for a fungicide resistant version of the rust. The full scale attack requires frequent spraying, maybe every couple of weeks for example. Some people use only a contact fungicide - less effective but low risk of resistance and much less expensive. I'm not sure if you're thinking of getting something now in anticipation, or just thinking ahead. I would wait and see if it happens first. Even UltraDawn dish soap diluted at 1% with water has shown some effectiveness in a scientific study. There's no one single answer to the question......it depends. If you go the fungicide route it should be something labeled and effective specifically for rust diseases, preferably tested for daylily rust.

You may find this article from the AHS Daylily Journal useful, it describes fungicide options and other control tactics:
http://www.daylilies.org/RustR...

Thank you Sue !!!

sooby said:You may find this article from the AHS Daylily Journal useful, it describes fungicide options and other control tactics:
http://www.daylilies.org/RustR...

Thank you, Sooby! Like JavaMom, I'm looking ahead to what might happen with my just-ordered daylilies!

Let's hope neither of you have to deal with it. In Zone 7a, Barbalee, there's a reasonable chance that in a "normal" winter it won't survive the winter, but some years it might especially if you have evergreens in a warmer spot, like next to a house. If you usually winter mulch you might not want to if you do get rust at some time.

I keep thinking I might be finding rust. Then I remember I've been putting out Cayenne pepper to discourage the puppy from burying his treasures in the DL containers. That seems to be working, but the Cayenne quickly fades and where it lands on the lower leaves starts resembling the photos I've seen of rust. What's the old saying - "fool me once, fool me twice..." - well I'm proof I can be fooled multiple times .

Active rust is a bright yellowish-orange color. Is cayenne pepper that color or darker reddish-orange?

Cayenne pepper starts out quite red, but after it's there for a day or two or three, it fades to yellowish-orange - just like in photos of rust . It does wash off the foliage easily.