The red and yellow daylily image is a 2009 introduction (registered with the A.H.S.) from LePetit Jardin Nursery by Ted and Susan Petit. The name of the daylily is Ruby Pearl Sullivan.
I'll be taking this evening's article in the direction of hybridizers - not how to hybridize.
Hybridizers are in the same mind status as scientists, inventors, research fellows, and any person who simply MUST change the world. In addition to hybridizing daylilies, Ted is a professor of psychology and neuroscience. It all fits.
If you've not ventured into their world, I suggest you bring up the Petit's site http://www.petitdaylilies.com/
The Ruby Pearl Sullivan daylily is for sale at $300. Come on, keep breathing - you can do it - now exhale. Good - shall we continue?
With some exceptions, the new plants from hybridizers are the fruit of many years of trial and error, throwing out perhaps tens of thousands of unworthy plants a year, keeping meticulous records and using other very expensive stock. You simply have to love it with a passion.
With other exceptions, these new introductions will be used by others to cross with their stock. They will be used by others for modeling a new popular attribute. And over time, if they are loved by the public, they will make a large amount of money for the person who owns the registration.
I'm not sure if the money portion is as important as the thrill and pride of knowing you have given the world something new. The description of the red & yellow lily is:
- 7 inch wonderfully ornate flower.
- Very ruffled heavy gold edge (often with looping angel wings.)
- Blooms rarely hang.
- Color is a revolutionary new red.
- 25-30 buds on each plant.
- Tall very well branched scapes with 3-4 laterals plus top branching.
- Extremely fertile.
- Parents are Streetcar Named Desire x (Promised Day x Anita McMaster)
The Petit's talk of using this lily (because of the breakthrough size) for other reds. What they are happy about and know they are one of the first: The red color with this edge with this size that isn't a spider and it's very fertile.
I imagine some people buy the newest and most expensive plants. Personally, I get a little nervous about buying any garden perennial that puts too much pressure on me to have them survive. Some things do not live in the garden no matter what we do or how hard we try OR how much it costs. It's why I don't buy expensive poppies or iris - some always die for who knows why.
But, if this proves popular to the public, after so many years, we will gradually begin to find it at nurseries and in catalogs and the price will go down.
I'm so grateful for people who have the patience, time and interest in hybridizing plants. What a joy they bring to an average gardener like me. I don't begrudge their asking price, who am I to judge the value of something I am clueless on what went into the making.
The pink and gold lily Goddess Devine is an example of the new "hot" design - the fully double. Plus this one has many other attributes. The market (customer driven) are demanding doubles. Cost $125.
I go to these sites every once in awhile and as I enlarge the picture full screen, I catch myself doing the fireworks' oooooo and awwwww. Now that I look again at Ruby Pearl Sullivan, it does kinda look like fireworks!
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