Ken, thanks for your thoughts. I am aware that our low humidity climate usually helps us against rust. I did not realize that shade would be a factor; we have a lot of shade here. I had never considered using a systemic fungicide in a bare-root plant dip. (Bleach, yes.) You have a good point about spore persistence (or not) in the garden soil, and about laying down some new mulch or covering topsoil.
I don't mind
occasionally having to do a foliage cut-back and spray with a Dawn (or bleach) solution - on certain selected plants. But when it gets to the point that too many plants need such treatment, because otherwise they are such rust buckets that they are ugly and are mass producing spores, then out they go. It is time for another Garden Purge.
My garden is by no means rust pristine, but by growing mostly resistant (or somewhat resistant) plants, the scourge is somewhat managed. And as you say - during certain parts of the year, you don't notice any problem, even on the rust buckets (unless maybe you look very closely and see the tell-tale dark brown spots).
I confess that it is problematic as to what to do when I want to give plants away. The reality - so far as I know - is that no amount of systemic fungicide is going to cure a plant once it is infected; all that they will do is suppress the rust. And as you yourself have noted, it is not always obvious if a plant is infected. (I have gotten at least one infected plant from a club sale; the plant looked pristine when I got it in the fall, but broke out in rust in the spring - it was the only rusty daylily in that part of the garden at that time. (I won't speak about plants which I have gotten from commercial gardens.)) This rust issue has kept me from giving plants away to the local club(s) (in the rare event that I can make a meeting). While I would not knowingly give away an infected plant, I might not be aware that the plant was infected, and I am not confident that any dip I would do would kill off any rust on AND in bareroot plants (and one club does potted plants, not bareroot). (Never mind that most of the daylily growers around here already probably have - or have had - rust in their gardens; no need to add to the problem. I am amazed that you managed to hold out until 2013.
)
With regards to giving plants to certain select individuals (I am speaking of non-daylily gardeners who are friends or relatives), I have settled on the following: a) Don't knowingly give away an infected plant (but as you yourself have noted, it may not always be obvious), b) Warn the recipient of any potential rust problem (and what to do about it if it crops up), c) If the recipient is not picky about plants, try to give them only or mostly rust resistant plants. (Sometimes people want a particular color, or a particular plant, or need bloom at a particular season.) Some of these plants have gone out in pots, but when they have been sent bare-root, I did dip them in a bleach solution. It helps that some of the people who I have given plants to live in cold winter areas; any rust they get will likely winter kill.
It's a problem. I see no solution, short of hybridizing for rust resistance (and that is not a sure cure either, due to different rust strains). At this point in time, I half expect/suspect any new plant I get to harbor rust. I am trying to force myself to buy only resistant cultivars, but such information is not always known (newer plants), and I'm as much a sucker for a pretty face, or the new-and-exciting, as anyone.
