Thanks for all of the positive comments..You are all way to gracious as I'm really not a writer..I always have all of this stuff in my head but I hate to write or type so it never gets down on paper too often..I suppose one of these days I'll write some sort of memory type book before mine(Memory) has diminished to the point where it's all fuzzy..It's funny, this little thing we call life..How when your young you wish it would hurry up and as you start reaching into middle age, you wish nothing more that it would slow down..LOL..I feel in my heart where I differ from the "franchise" is that I would do it anyway whether I made another dollar from it or not..I really do enjoy it..I do not like the business aspect of it that much as far as the filling of orders and dealing with habitual complainers. But that's part of it and it goes with the territory...I do not want to be known as someone who just introdused a pretty face or another mauve with a eye and matching edge...LOL..Not slamming them..Just think that the eye and edge thing has run amuck..I would love to see even bigger full forms up to 10" or so on statuesque plants in the 4-6 foot range..That would be a worthy path I feel..Instead of clogging up the 24-30 inch height range with more of the same..(we still hybridize full forms btw) I just got off the phone with Brian Mahieu earlier tonight telling him how excited I was to see such good plants in our intro's...Plants, not just a face...As I have filled hundreds of orders this spring it has become evident that both Brian and myself have taken the right path in selecting for the plant before the bloom. Details such as mature clumps that just fall apart instead of having to hack up woody type clusters of crowns..Things like beautiful cool mint green foliage that almost has a waxy look to it, and foliage of different colors of burgundy and purple and a few stable variegated ones as well...I loved digging a clump of Svenska today..The fans were spaced apart far enough to lay your fingers in between them on mature clumps..And then to discover this mint green foliage with burgundy pink edges on every leaf was a nice treat as well..I noticed a clump of a select seedling that was completely chartreuse in color..The only one in the field. Not sick or iron defficient, just a very healthy chartreuse...Can't wait to see it bloom..This is a few of the reasons I do this..To really try to get "plants" out there..I lopve trying to figure out why a cross isn't taking..I did probably 30-40 attempts with Scandinavian pollen on Brushed By Bluebirds with not one pod...on my last attempt I selfed BBB and it pulled the trigger and all 20 of my BBB pods with Scandinavia pollen took giving me 96 seeds..Things like that is why I do it...To try and get pods on plants that are pod infertile is a goal for me..I have had some luck doing everything from spraying different sprays to just pleading with the daylily Gods..LOL..Another thing Brain and me play around with is utilizing Tet. pollen via unreduced gametes..We have alot of luck with this and what better way to get Tet genes into your programs..I love good buds and branching..Someting I'm getting better at than when I started...I have some insanely branched and Budded seedlings with amazing increase and rhisomates growth like Kwanso that have come out of crosses like (Citrina X Linda)X (Galaxy Explosion X Hankow)X (Jungle Fowl X Thorhalla) X (Species X Species)..Once you get a line of breeding like that, you can then be assured of a total plant and then have an aweful lot of fun playing around with the blooms..I dont do it for recognition..I dont do it to conform to the standard..I dont go to shows, and don't have time to visit other gardens..I don't care about awards or ribbons..My fulfillment for this is rather simple and I am rewarded every morning I get to see the sunrise and watch all the Bluebirds we have, to watch our little pygmy goats and donkeys play..To have my faithful sidekick cat Mango come to me and love on me without judgement..and to be able to see that seedling bloom for the first time..And of course my family whom without my wife Laura, I would in no way be able to get it all done..My boys are a big help as well...I love all the people I have met..I love seeing peoples faces when they see a bloom that is speacial to there eye and then laugh when they leave with a yellow nose without telling them..I hope all of us who enjoy gardening and daylilies in particular can reflest like this from time to time and not forget why we do this...Antway, enough of my ramblings...Hope I didn't bore the heck out of ya..Later Taters...David.

Plants are normally diploid, meaning they have two chromosomes, that pair up in replication to make seeds. Tetraploids have double the number of chromosomes. Many hybrids are sterile because the diploid chromosomes don't match up properly with each other, being that they come from two different species. But, when doubled, by mutation, they can line up with the other matching one to make the plant viable. So, tetraploids are capable of producing seed, which produces plants nearly exactly like the parent. The best known example in gesneriads are the mini-sinningia hybrids like 'Cindyella', 'Dollbaby', and all the hundreds of hybrids produced from them. Back in the 60's these hybrids were first created by crossing the then, new, large flowered species, eumorpha with the tiny micromini species, pusilla and concinna. The two crosses made 'Dollbaby' and 'Cindy', both of which were completely sterile. They had no value in hybridizing and could only be propagated by removing and rooting crowns (the growth of foliage and flowers that arrise from the tuber). Then, by accident growers discovered mutants in propagations of first one and then the other. Tetraploids can be hard to spot, but they are generally larger in all aspects. So, the bigger foliage and flowers were what were first noticed. Then it was seen that they readily produced seed from self pollination. They were then used to produce many generations of hybrids, all of which were tetraploids. From a grower's standpoint, tetraploids can be more vigorous, have larger leaves and flowers, be more brittle, be a little hardier to cold, and be hairier. There are probably other characteristics; but, these come to mind. Sometimes tetraploids are not desirable, such as in the mini strep hybrid 'Mighty Mouse'. A tetraploid version was found, and was very fertile, but it lost all of the miniature charm of the diploid hybrid. When tetraploids are crossed with diploids they usually produce hybrids of poor fertility, known as triploids, and the tetraploid dominates the cross. But it depends on the genus and family of plants we are talking about. In cymbidium orchids, many of the most beautiful and popular hybrids are triploids, which generally are sterile or nearly sterile. There are also some tetraploid achimenes, but I don't know anything about them. I think Kartuz lists a bunch of these. Jon

Yep, yep, yep to everything Bill said. When I first tried growing plumies I attempted to keep them going over the winter in a heated greenhouse. They still dropped their leaves. It was a response to the shorter days as well as temps. The following year I tried to keep a few going in the greenhouse by adding supplimental lighting. They kept growing but didn't look great and didn't do as well the following spring as the plants that did have a dormancy period. There are some evergreen varieties that retain their folige year round. Unless you have one of those varieties I think they do better when given a rest. We are in a severe drought with temps around 100 for the past month. I never water my plumies twice, or even once a day and they are in a very well draining mix. I soak them well every week or two and let them dry out between watering. I feed them every two weeks during the growing season and stop fertilizing about a month before they go dormant. I do water young seedlings more often. Karyn

The condition "dormancy" is, in respect to the majority of Hippeastrums, including all the TETraploid Dutch "Gardeners' Amaryllis" hybrids - ALREADY fullfilled by a prolonged period at 13° Celsius and 9 to 17° Celsius respectively, with very sparse watering perfectly from below . During which period the crop will not even loose its leaves. The removal of the leaf crown is technically required BUT for a dry storage without light - for the inconvenience of handling 100s and 1000s of bulbs during a lack of appropriate locations indoors, if not even as bare bulbs without Substrate for commercial purposes. And it allows for a closer inspection of the bulb and for sanitizing measures. The most promising Approach for a year around cultivation is imho: At the windowsill with substrate heating by the central heating unit underneath, up to 27° Celsius, during November to May of the new year, then relocation to outside at a place shielded from rain, and then you will obtain new bloom 3 months later. One of my specimens of "Flamenco Queen" surprised me with a late Bloom in October, outside that was, and now, after re-relocation to the windowsill, I am about to obtain one scape more.