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tny78

Question about crosses

TNY78
10 years ago

This is probably a silly question, and I almost feel ridiculous asking, but I can't find the answer anywhere online...

I've been crossing my own daylilies for a couple of years, and completely understand how the process of intentionally crossing daylilies works....but...what I can't find is how the crosses work when pods form and I haven't crossed them. For example, I had quite a few pods set on Big Kiss, but didn't intentionally use it as a pod parent. So....is it Big Kiss x Unknown, or Big Kiss x Big Kiss? I always harvest them, but I don't know what the proper way to label them is. I don't know whether to thank the bees for taking pollen from another daylily, or if it self-pollinated...or both...help!

Thanks,
Tammy

Comments (6)

  • Julia WV (6b)
    10 years ago

    BIG KISS X UNKNOWN is the way I would label it since I would have no idea if it was a cross of itself or pollen carried from a nearby plant.
    BTW, no question is silly.

    Julia

  • TNY78
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    Thanks Julia :) I feel like that's something I should have already known, but I just couldn't find the answer! That's how I've been labeling them, but then I think I started to overthink it...

    Tammy

  • alameda/zone 8/East Texas
    10 years ago

    I breed horses - when we show pedigree information, we do thusly: [father x mother]. When I have a pod like yours that is fertilized by the bees or ?? I label [unknown x Big Kiss], as I look at the plant with the pod as the mother. I wouldn't think it matters, as long as you know which is which. The opposite may be correct in plant breeding. This is just easier for me to remember since I have classified my horses this way for so many years.
    Judith

  • TNY78
    Original Author
    10 years ago

    I'm not positive either, but I think in daylilies its POD PARENT X POLLEN PARENT. In this case, I would know the pod parent (mother), but not the pollen parent (father). That's how I've been listing them anyway. I may have it totally backward though :)

    I have horses, but I never thought about how their pedigree was set up. i'll have to take a look at their papers. :)
    Tammy

    This post was edited by TNY78 on Sat, Feb 15, 14 at 18:23

  • dementieva
    10 years ago

    Tammy is right -- Correct notation is POD x POLLEN (or MOTHER x FATHER if you want to think of it that way).

    If it helps, normally UNKNOWN will always come last (NAME x UNK). The only way to get UNK x NAME is if you are crossing onto plants that you can't identify or your labels get partially lost.

    As for horses, I think we can all be glad that they never self-pollinate. :o)

    Nate

  • polymerous
    10 years ago

    If I recall correctly, the Reinkes used to (and perhaps still do) use the notation of POD PARENT x Chance, when the pollen parent was unknown. (Whether or not these "Chance" pods were all strictly bee pods I don't know... but it sounds better to me than "unknown".)

    Right now I am trying to germinate seed from a seedling of uncertain ancestry. (The seedling was planted just prior to rotator cuff surgery, iirc, and in my haste to get several last minute garden things done I did not make a record/map of what seedlings were planted out, never mind where. Critters did for the label before I could pay the seedlings any attention. Somehow the list of what seedlings I *did* have (regardless of whether or not they got planted) got lost.) The hybridizing clip on one of the pods was lost, meaning that not only do I not know what the pod parent for the cross is, I also don't know what the pollen parent is! In the unlikely event that the seedlings (if any) from this seed thrive and one is worthy of registration (hah!), I would have to list the parentage as "Sdlg x unknown".

    (Fwiw I do have strong suspicions as to the ancestry of the seedling - at least with respect to one ancestor - and there were a limited number of prospective pollen parents I would have used. Unfortunately, I did not record each and every cross as I made it; it is much easier to just clip the pod and sort it all out and record the data when the seed is collected. Doubly unfortunate (and just to add more confusion), last season I made some spontaneous and unplanned crosses, and I also deliberately let the bees set some pods, and one or the other might have been true for this seedling (or the bees might have beaten me to it). Aieeee! It will either be fun - or frustrating - to try to guess "who's the daddy".)