Maryl- lol I suppose. It just seems crazy to me. I figured it was based on demand. David Austin's Juliet rose reportedly cost near $1,000,000 to 'create' and you can buy one for $37. Many times new introductions are sold out in days. Still, theyre only$29- $37.

I'm so sorry you had issues w RRD. I know it's been devastating for many. Luckily we don't have that issue in my region. Yet.

So I guess I'm out on the dayliliy game. One fan for $50+ is just too much. Ah well...

Sarah, I make a point to shop around . There are enough daylilies out there that it isnt necessary to pay huge bucks to get a lovely daylily. Of course you can , and some will but not me . I bought 3 daylilies that were over 50 dollars when I started collecting . They were no better and no worse than some of the $8 daylilies I bought so I gave myself a talking to and now I will never pay more than 25 dollars for a double fan of a relatively new daylily. The drop in price is relatively quick so I have found daylilies that are a mere 4 years old that are 10 to 15 dollars. Much more reasonable. !

Signet- I really like the picture of Bubblegum delicious by Shive. I looked it up and it's under $25 . Yay! You're right, there are some pretty ones for reasonable prices. Thank for your input and encouragement!

Sarah , good for you ! Glad you found something you like. I know the hybridizer's wouldn't be impressed with my position but then they are in the market to make money. I just found with a little effort I was able to find the same daylily for say $10 or $15 that on another site was priced at $50 .....so guess which site I am going to buy from and I don't have as many choices as the folks down in the USA have . Shopping around sure does pay off.

Sarah - There are many beautiful older daylilies selling for under $20. Usually only people who are hybridizing pay the $100-$200 rate for a new intro. Try Oak Hill Daylilies, Dancing Daylilies or the Lily Auction. In my opinion, daylilies haven't changed much in the past 15 years. And they depreciate quicker than cars.

Debra

Sarah - You can buy Bubblegum Delicious for $10 from Schreiners Iris Gardens. I paid only $10 for mine.

Debra

If you are not hybridizing, you do not need the very latest and most expensive. I would suggest the lily auction to you, but be aware even at much lower proces, you can spend more than you intend to spend...But you can also get wonderful prices on beautiful daylilies.

One of the reasons in the huge price disparity of new rose introductions and daylily introductions is the propagation method. Roses are usually budded. One plant can provide a lot of bud wood that is then grafted onto a rootstock that is grown by the thousands. Daylilies are produced by natural increase, which in the north can be slow. For example, a daylily we intend to introduce next year first bloomed in 2011 and now we have about 19 double fans. The scarcity would push the prices up.

Here's another reason. Most roses introduced today are patented. That means that anyone who sells that rose legally must be licensed to sell it and a portion of the price goes back to the patent holder. The patent holder has the life of the patent to make a profit. Daylilies are not patented so as soon as the hybridizer sells a plant, that plant can be propagated by others and sold and the hybridizer gets nothing. So essentially, he has a very short window of time to recoup his costs of producing it.

Prices for new introductions often stay high with the hybridizer, but on the secondary market, they drop quickly. Like others said, there are many sellers on the Lily Auction who have reasonably priced newer introductions.

Daylily hybridization is an expensive business. There are not many hybridizers who do it to make a living. The sheer numbers of daylilies one must grow to get one worthy of introduction is mind boggling. Many hybridizers are growing 30,000+ seedlings every year to get a few to introduce.

Nancy

I won't pay the high prices for daylilies because of losing too many. I don't know if it's critters or root rot, but a lot of mine just disappear.

Hoosier Nan. Some daylilies are patented . Stella D'oro was the parent plant that led to the first patented daylily "Happy Returns" and started the patenting fad . Most of Apps daylilies are now patented and some of Petit's are patented too .There are a number of other daylilies patented by other hybridizers too. Here is a tiny bit of info here.

http://snyderfarm.rutgers.edu/pdfs/tg-appstersdaylilies.pdf

and some info on some more patented daylilies

http://patents.justia.com/patents-by-us-classification/PLT/312

Signet, it is true that there are patented daylilies. They are primarily intended to be sold at garden centers for $8.99 a pot or so. And the same would be true of them as roses--you have the life of the patent to make a profit. We heard Greg Goff from La Petit Jardin speak at our club. He worked at a production facility in Mexico that produced thousands of these daylilies for garden centers.

Most hybridizers I know don't sell enough of their intros to go to the expense of patenting them. I hear that process is quite expensive. Some hybridizers might have only 10-15 to sell the first year.

However, it anyone ever gets the elusive blue daylily, I'll bet that one gets patented.

Nancy

ive found almost every single pattern that is selling for $100 DF you can find a similar looking daylily for $5 DF. just takes time to look around. someone on another forum told me about this website and i spent hours yesterday looking through some catalogs. http://www.plantstep.com/catalogs.psl 

Plantstep is a good source as long as you realize that some of those "catalogs" are used just for that persons record keeping , are not updated regularly and some are quite old . That doesnt mean to say the seller/person attached to the listing doesnt have the plant it just means that they may or may no longer use that catalogue . I have tried contacting several and get no replies.

Anolther good way to find daylily sites is to just google -- which state or province you want to see websites for & daylilies or hemerocallis ,.

Another excellent site is Charlotte's Daylily Diary . She has listings for hundreds of websites. Charlotte makes a point of keeping updates noted Here is the link: http://www.daylilydiary.com/ Have fun , you may be there for a while .LOL

Thank you for all the great information everyone! I truly appreciate your input and advice!

And it makes sense what Hoosier says about how roses have bud wood vs. natural increase. There has been a recent concentration on own root roses, but they are still from cuttings. I also realize alot goes into breeding and improving color for daylilies.

I ordered from the dayliliy auction a few years ago (seed) that I had wonderful success with, 100% germination. They were Shores of Time x Raspberry Frost cross, but sadly never got to see them bloom (left the ex). It's alot of fun to look at all the new introductions and the great variety. And yes Organic Kitten- I can see how easy it would be to overspend w/o even trying! So many pretties! My weak point- teeth and chicken fat lol.

Thanks again to everyone!