@rkrende
@Hemlady
What Hemlady says is most likely true, your orange ditchlilies or Kwanso have taken over your bed of daylilies and the other colors have had no chance to grow. Once a daylily has been crossed with another, the resulting plants have a new gene or two added, the genetics have forever been changed and won't revert to either parent. It was explained to me one time like this:
If you have a cup of flour and you add a spoon full of sugar to it, you no longer have that original cup of flour. You have a whole new cup of something, but not the original flour. If you take out a spoonful of the mix, you still have flour+sugar, another spoonful might give you more sugar than flour or more flour than sugar, but it will still contain the mix, never again will it be the original cup of flour because the grains of sugar have become a part of that flour. Same when you cross two different daylilies. One might show more of one parent than the other, but it won't ever be simply either parent again. Most likely you can add genes but you can't take them away, at least that's true for most of us.
On the other hand, there are people like
@admmad who have devoted a lifetime of studies and work in the field of genetics, particularly that of daylilies, for whom I have the deepest respect. Maurice, as Juli said previously, we really appreciate the information and the truths you bring to our discussions. I've spent the better part of 50 years with daylilies, growing them, tending them and enjoying them. I know a lot about their history, from the old ditchlily onward through Stout's studies in the early 1900s, but I've never been involved in hybridizing except to enjoy the results.
However, I have read of many studies pertaining to daylilies and a year or two ago happened upon a series of articles in an AHS publication that came as a result of in depth scientific studies of daylilies. Not being very scientific oriented, I didn't give those articles much thought but one in particular stuck in my mind: Daylily Genetics 3 Variegated or Broken Flower Colors: Jumping Genes. I remembered it last night when I was reading various threads in the Daylily Forum and I had to look it up again because honestly all I remembered about the article was the 'Jumping Genes' part of the title. That term seemed to fit what Claudia had showed us and I've always delighted in catchy word phrases. I found what was written about that article and others related to it, I'll have to get a copy of the AHS Journal to read it through again. What I also found is that Maurice was the scientific mind behind those articles and that delightful 'Jumping Genes' title that I remembered, and I found his doctorate in plant genetics to be an eyeopener. And here I find him again on ATP with down to earth explanations that even I can understand. . . if ever there is to be an understanding of the tricks that Nature sometimes plays.
So one more time, Maurice, thank you for your contributions and for your lifetime of studies pertaining to this beautiful plant, the daylily. From humble beginnings it has taken quite a turn in the past hundred years. It's a little bit humbling to think I have spent my entire adult life tending these gentle flowers and never knew till now what complex beauties they could and absolutely did become. And now because of people like Char and Juli, Tink, Hemlady, Betty, Spunky and numerous others who hybridize, I'm learning more every day.
@Claudia, you are my shining star, your question and your pictures jolted my mind and my thoughts.
