AGAINST ALL ODDS

Hi to all on this beautiful sunny 70 degree day! It's been a long cold Winter and I am happy to report that after a long cold Spring also, we are having some beautiful weather! I was out in the dayliliy field this morning getting a start on my 'summer tan' of black fingernails! 

When I write a blog, it usually is a result of some kind of an inspiration; this time it was a phrase that just stuck in my brain: "AGAINST ALL ODDS".

As most people know by now, genetics are like that also...I was born with auburn hair and my parents and sister were all brunettes....AGAINST ALL ODDS. Unless you have an understanding of elementary genetics that says my auburn hair came as a result of combining two recessives. 

So with that in mind, I decided to show a series of daylily collages whereby both the parents are displayed in the larger photos and then a row of three across shows their progeny. I chose cultivars that I really didn't think I would get as nice results as I did, since all of the parents are older, and yet AGAINST ALL ODDS some true beauties have resulted. 

This first one has a story behind it that I featured on my website at  www.gardenglory.net  Just click on the SEEDS OF HOPE, column left. 
The story is about the one in the center that we nick-named "subtle faith". The parent seedling on the left is a FESTIVE ART seedling and the other parent is one of my new intros named SEEDS OF HOPE out of PALACE GARDEN BEAUTY. Its name came about because of the story I referred to above. It reminds me how I hoped that "Subtle"(its garden-name) could clarify the FESTIVE ART seedling that I garden-named "Fertile Myrtle" because it was the most fertile daylily I had ever used! 

Below is a result of breeding a seedling back to itself. When this is done, all the good and all the bad are revealed. I did this as a challenge from my son and I am so glad I did. I am happy to report very few disappointments and numerous thrills. That in fact was a shock-I expected many duds! But you can see three of the results for yourself. The two large photos are of the one parent on two different days; FIRSTBOURNE OF MANY is its introduction/registered name. FIRSTBOURNE went on to be a really good parent when outcrossed also-another blessing!  




Now along comes a seedling from some Lily Auction seeds I purchased. I got so excited about it because it had all the fancy frills of Southern bred hybrids and was grown up here in the Northern Tundra! The parentage is (PEARL HARBOR  X  BEFORE MY EYES) and as you can see, it became much fancier-especially more so than PEARL HARBOR. But fancy isn't everything-it has to have a good plant habit underneath and we will be 'proving' it the next three years to see what it's all about.

Below is a group of three deep red seedlings that came out of either a (JAMAICAN MIDNIGHT seedling  X ABLAZE IN GLORY) or in the center, (JAMAICAN MIDNIGHT X ABLAZE IN GLORY). JAMAICAN MIDNIGHT is a lovely older almost black creation that I will most likely always keep. ABLAZE IN GLORY is my new iridescent red 2013 Spring intro out of (CRITICAL MASS X BEAR CLAWS).  AGAINST ALL ODDS, it came about- only five Lily Auction seeds, one germinated, one intro! I was told many years ago that you can expect one good intro out of 1,000 seeds! 

This final collage shows WESTBOURTNE NIGHTLY PRAYERS (left) x RUFFLED STRAWBERRY PARFAIT. I purchased WESTBOURNE NIGHTLY PRAYERS because of its genetics in the background. It had STARTLE in it which was known to give some great edges. I bred it to RUFFLED STRAWBERRY PARFAIT because RSP had already proven itself to me to give some lovely reds and pinks with teeth. Despite RUFFLED STRAWBERRY PARFAIT being very very linebred, it gave me only one "look-a-like" of itself and one lovely ivory one also. The rest in this pairing were all very colorful-which is what I love-COLOR!!

If you have read this blog for any length of time you are probably wondering where the spiritual ramblings are...truthfully-I don't know either! I guess sometimes beauty speaks for itself and AGAINST ALL ODDS these creations came with a smidgen of help from these hands and the rest was done by the Creator, THE Author of Beauty, the Creator of you  and me, whom He loves very much and is VERY PROUD of each and every one of His creations, large or small, animal, plant or human. Oh may we be reminded of how much He loves all of us..whether it feels like He does or not...May we see our beauty as He sees it!
Amen

THE AUTHOR OF BEAUTY

Hello to all my friends out there in 'Blogdom'!

This morning I was reading out ot the Apocrypha in the section of Wisdom of Solomon and I found this interesting phrase:

'THE AUTHOR OF BEAUTY' and I could'nt resist comtemplating on that phrase. As I have written numerous times before, the daylilies always bring me into awesome contemplation on beauty and the Author of Beauty.

    When we look at a painting
                 or a photograph
                 or a flower
                 or a wood carving
                 or a statue 
                   such as 'David

   We not only see the beauty
           we love the beauty
          we adore the beauty
 we may even covet the beauty.
   So with great effort and much       
                      dedication
we pursue that beauty, even if at times that pursuing,                
      that attainment
              requires sacrifice
                     but
         no matter the sacrifice,
             we have conquered!

           And yet we have lost-

             be it relationships,
                   finances, jobs,
                  homes, families,
                   we have lost.

While all the time the very thing
                   we 'worshiped', 
            the thing we coveted,
               became our demise.

How easy to forget
      The Creator that gave to us
              the material
              the knowledge
              the understanding
              the skill
      to create a thing of beauty.

When in all reality,
  all truthfullness,
  He and only He is 
the Author of Beauty.

Then and only then can we truly appreciate what we have been
              given, given to 
                    enjoy, 
                     but 
               not to idolize,
               not to worship,
because we think we created it. 
Oh may we humble ourselves and worship the Creator of all things, the Author of Beauty!

    John 15:5 says "...without Me you can do nothing". We need to think on that and really know what that means! 

      Below are some of the beauties I have been blessed to have a small part in with our Author of Beauty. They are all out of one of my favorite cultivars, RUFFLED STRAWBERRY PARFAIT.

 The parent of the one to the left is a seedling named "Beyond Comprehension"  and RSP. It is the full sib to the ruffled salmon one below and a clear vivid red with fascinating midrib details.

 This one to the right and above is 3/4 related to the
red one below as it is also from an IMPERIAL WIZARD seedling X RSP. I dubbed it 'Salmon Catch' as it is the clean color of salmon. It stands 36" tall and is 6-7" in bloom size and has 'quite the teeth'.

 The one to the left is out of an IMPERIAL WIZ-ARD seedling X RSP. I see a pattern trying to
evolve in the center. It is very tall and well branched
also.

 Can you see this one to the right
towering above the others?
It is a whopping 52" high! I 'dubbed'
it 'Neck High' as that's where it reaches
up to me! The pic at the top of this
blog is a closeup of it. It is out of a tall
BROADWAY RUBY SLIPPERS
seedling which was ver unexpected
because BRS is very red BUT quite
short!
The deep red one below, with a red halo is out of a JAMAICAN MID-NIGHT seedling x RSP. It too is quite tall. It has a definite black overlay to it and seems to go darker to the edge.

This JAMAICAN MIDNIGHT seedling x RSP stands 44" tall! I garden named it "Above All Else". This bloomed for the first time last year in our horrible summer so I am just hoping and praying  that it will shine even more with at least an average summer!

 And yet another JAMAICAN MIDNIGHTseedling X RSP in a beautiful true cherry with extra wide
 petals, some undulating ruffles and gold glitz.

 This deep ruby red velvet bloom (below) brought these words out of my mouth when I saw it:
 "Just what I wanted!" It is fully related to the cherry red seedling above, and yet it has ivory teeth and much deeper colors! It is one of the latest bloomers in the garden which really sets off a spark of color near the end of the season.

The camera doesn't fully capture the unusal colors of this JAMAICAN
MIDNIGHT seedling X RSP. It is a rose mauve with true lavender/grape ruffles and watermarked eye that is lined in purple. I never would have guessed this combination of colors, much less the amount of ruffles coming from a JAMAICAN MIDNIGHT seedling!

 The eye from this one came from my ew Fall intro RAINBOW OF GLORY
and it as you can tell by now has RSP as the other parent. Again the camera doesn't capture how it just 'beams' out as you as you look at it , but it does! I garden named it 'Beam". I might just breed it to the one above and double up on the color and on RSP and mabe put some ruffely teeth on the edge! It is a late bloomer like RSP.

The one below is a full sib with completely different colors and characteristics-that's what I so enjoy about breeding-the element of surprise!

 Below is a beautiful red bitone with a shadow of a deeper red eye that I will be using in my Red-on-Red pattern program. It is out of my new intro ABLAZE IN GLORY (CRITICAL MASS X BEAR CLAWS)
 X RSP and has very wide petals again with a wonderful toothy glitzy yellow edge.  It's first year of bloom gave only 10 buds and 2way branching (during that horrible summer I wrote about) and is 28" x 5.5"

 Below is a full sib to the seedling above and sports orange teeth on a cherry bloom with a deeper cherry halo in the center.

 ABLAZE IN GLORY X RSP gave a large array of reds...the one below is a very dark red velvet with the beginnings of bear claws. This is the rebloom scape. I like the very green throat and hint of a halo to work with.

 The one above is the same cross as the two above (AIG X RSP) and yet it has quite a wild edge and the colors are toward the pink spectrum. I hope the 10 buds and 2 way branching gets much better!

 This red seedling above and below is out of one of my favorite cardinal red seedlings out of (HEAL THY SPIRIT X MORT MORSS) and RUFFLED STRAWBERRY PARFAIT. It was beautiful every day and the edging was so fancy that I garden-named it ' Christmas Ornament'. I love the bronze color on the teeth...just like an ornate picture frame!

 Below is a full sib to the seedling above, and yet in totally different red tones, with a lavender shaddowy eye and white teeth. Hopefully Even more teeth will come this summer since this was it's first year of bloom. The velvet texture is something that really appeals to me! So does the glowing green throat.

 You can see the clump effect in the
photo to the right.First year bloom, bad summer weather and yet three blooms at one time on a well branched scape!
 I like!!

 Below are a few of the RSP X SEIZE THE NIGHT seedlings that looked particularly good last summer. For many of them this was their 2nd year of bloom. This first pic and two other pics of it is garden named 'Bronze Teeth' , a very smooth happy daylily.

 The photo above of 'Bronze Teeth is during the later, hotter , dry days.
Below is a full sib garden-named 'Curley Cewels' taken after a downpour in the night. It is a pink rose with yellow tendrils and teeth, a deep green throat.

Below is an older RUFFLED STRAWBERRY PARFAIT X UKN seedling that has some beautiful babies on the ground. It is a very smooth red with a pink watermark, gold teeth and always flat and wide open no mmatter what the weather!

 The next few are out of WESTBOURNE NIGHTLY PRAYERS X RUFFLED STRAWBERRY PARFAIT and most of them bloomed 2 yrs from planting. these are all full sibs.

 We dubbed this one to the right and
below, Green Teeth for obvious reasons.

Even though this one is only 18" tall (first year bloom so it may get taller) it is worty of observation, not only for its abundant beautiful toothiness, but for its vivid intense colors.  Very few buds last summer, but I sure am hoping for greater things! It's very late so I need to be patient! 

 WBPXRSP below garden-named Men's Prayer Breakfast'

 WBPXRSP above named "Prayer Vigil" with pure white teeth.

WBPXRSP "Triple Pink"

 WBPXRSP we came across the one above last summer and the first thing we said was "Whoa"!!
The two photos below is of a full sib garden-named "Wiskers".

Apocrypha Wisdom of Soloman 13:3-5
'If through delight in the beauty of these things men assumed  them to be gods, let them know how much better than these is their Lord, for the Author of Beauty created them. And if men were amazed at their power and working, let them perceive from them how much powerful is He who formed them. For from the greatness and beauty of created things comes corresponding perception of their Creator.

    It is my hope that you will be reminded how special you are as one of Gods' beautiful creations and that you will look at life a little differently when you recognize the AUTHOR OF BEAUTY in a very real and personal way. 
God Bless.....

Nancy