Nerine x Lycoris hybrids . . . ?
J.E. Shields (Sun, 21 Nov 2004 10:39:58 PST)

Tom and all,

Habranthus, Zephyranthes, Sprekelia, and Rhodophiala all seem to cross with
one another, at least sometimes. There have been occasional articles on
the bigeneric hybrids in Rain Lilies published in HERBERTIA over the
years. Since Rhodophiala bifida is hardy here where I live, I would like
to see someone using it to breed both rich red flower color and cold
tolerance into some of the Rain Lilies.

If someone is going to try this, a compilation of chromosome counts for the
species in this group would be very handy. I don't plan to work in this
area, but I would be happy to field test any potentially hardy Rain Lily
hybrids that anyone creates.

I unfortunately don't have pictures of any of the wide intergeneric hybrids
that Margot made way back when.

Regards,
Jim Shields
in central Indiana (USA), USDA zone 5

At 07:49 AM 11/21/2004 -0800, you wrote:

Jim,

By any chance do you have a photo of any of the very wide crosses?

To stretch the topic a bit, yesterday a few of us were discussing the lack
of good color in Habranthus, and the possibility of hybidizing some
in. You mention a bit on this on your web page. Do you know if this has
ever been done, and were there pictures taken of the resulting flower?

Thanks

Tom Glavich

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Jim Shields USDA Zone 5 Shields Gardens, Ltd.
P.O. Box 92 WWW: http://www.shieldsgardens.com/
Westfield, Indiana 46074, USA
Tel. ++1-317-867-3344 or toll-free 1-866-449-3344 in USA