Growing Daylilies from Seed

A Complex Process?

If you look through the 'helpful tips' shared on sites like Facebook for starting daylily seeds, you'll get the impression that it is a complicated process and apparently getting more complicated every season. Refrigeration, dormancy, peroxide, wet and dry storage, heat mats, pre-sprouted seeds, fungicides, and fungus gnats!  

Some growers pre-sprout seeds in paper towels and then carefully tweeze them apart so as to try to not break off the roots or tops as they are placed individually into planting holes.  Some growers use heat mats or a large individual pot for each seed. Some growers start their seeds indoors in the fall under lights, and then have six or seven months of caring for seedlings before spring. Once they get tall enough to touch the lights, they get a 'haircut' with scissors. Some people measure out peroxide to add to the soaking solution.  Some growers transplant very small seedlings into bigger pots to give them 'root room' and some keep them in larger pots for more than a year to be sure they can endure the outdoors. 

Yikes! Daylilies must be a real specialty plant with exacting requirements for germination and growth...or not!

Hardy Perennials that can be Directly Sown

Let's get back to basics...daylilies are hardy perennials that naturally scatter their seeds on the ground in late summer to fall, to sprout with the fall rains or to germinate the next spring.  Following this logic, there are many growers who 'direct sow' their seeds into prepared ground in late fall.  This is often done after Thanksgiving in order to avoid immediate sprouting, for the seeds to germinate the next spring.  Seeds can be sown as close or as far apart as space allows, and up to an inch deep. This works very well for some growers who swear by this method.  The 'pros' of direct sowing are that it's a time-saver and money-saver (no transplanting, which is a shock to the plant, no indoor watering, no lights to buy, no increase in your electric bill, no pots or potting soil to buy).  The 'cons' are that mice or voles may find your seed, moles may mess up your planting and labels, first-year growth is limited to the length of the growing season, the bed could wash out due to heavy rain. and various critters could decide to dig in your bed.  Despite the 'cons', a number of experienced and successful growers use direct sowing and leave the plants in place until they bloom and are selected or disposed of. 

We choose to start them indoors

Here at Cherry Hill, we do opt for starting our seeds indoors.  As experienced growers of indoor plants for years, it was easy to gravitate to this option. We do, however, keep it as simple and easy as possible.  Our seeds are collected as they ripen here in west-central Indiana,  In the heat of summer, that is about six weeks from the date of pollination, or up to eight weeks in the cooler weather of late summer and fall.  Seeds are sorted for firmness.  Squishy ones or ones that crush (no contents!) are discarded and the remaining 'good' seeds are labeled as to parents, and left out in the family room to dry for two or three days. If you do this, however, take precautions against toddlers and cats. Either may result in a lot of unknown parentages (UNK X UNK). 

Dry, Cold Storage

After drying, the seeds are put into individual small zip-lock, labeled bags and stored in the refrigerator. It is imperative that the seeds be dry, and a small (1" x 1") piece of paper towel is placed in each packet to minimize moisture. We have not had problems with mold for the most part since bad seeds have been removed.  If a seed molds in dry storage, it wasn't any good to start with. 

Rehydrating or Wet Stratification

We don't start our seeds until late January.  During the last week of that (long and boring) month, the paper towel piece is removed from a number of the packets and some distilled water is added.  The bag is re-sealed and put back into the refrigerator for three or four days:

Occasionally a seed or two will already show a white root starting to barely show. Our unproven guess is that the evergreens and maybe semi-evergreens show this early sprouting, while dormants seem more recalcitrant. At any rate, after a few days of wet, cool storage, the whole batch is planted. With this treatment, we have 85 to 90% germination, usually within a week or so.  With a few crosses, the whole bunch is unusually slow to sprout.  Last season, one diploid cross seemed to have not been 'a match made in heaven' and it took weeks for just a few to sprout.  It happens. 

Planting

We use a sterile potting medium, Burpee's Seed Starting Mix:

 put into 72-cell tray inserts, with 12 six-packs in each tray, so, 72 seeds per tray:

  This year (2022) after cleaning, we have 2995 seeds, which will require 42 trays. We plant one seed per cell and clearly label the first and last of each cross.  The potting medium is moistened before planting and then watered with a fungicide afterwards.  We use Captan, which is an older fungicide, cheap, available, and not very high on the list of toxins. A spoonful of Captan in about two cups of warm water, shaken to dissolve, and watered in. 

The trays are placed closely under LED lights.  We used to grow under shop lights with (the cheapest) cool white bulbs, but decided to try LED shop lights.  No particular spectrum is needed since we are only growing foliage and not blooms, which require more red spectrum.

Watering and Fertilization

I water from the top, which is counter to much of the advice you'll get.  I found that watering from the bottom left water in the tray, which can lead to rot. Seeds sprout in a week or a bit more:

 and stay in their trays until they go outside in April, around the middle of the month, our average last frost date.  By that time the roots have formed a pretty solid mass and many are searching the tray for more room:

 

While they are under lights, the plants are watered on demand, that is, as each cell needs water.. It takes a while and during the dreary days of winter, I check them every day and likely water a few or many, depending on the need.  Once they have developed two leaves, I start watering with a solution of Miracle Gro every time I water, 1/4 tsp. per gallon. The plants grow well with lights on 24 hours a day, which helps keep them from getting lanky.  No 'haircut' is ever given, since this removes the food-producing leaf surface.  No transplanting, but increasingly frequent watering as the plants grow.  Once we reach a date where we have had the 'last' frost, the plants go outside in light shade and are gradually moved into full sun over the next two weeks. No sunburn, no setback, but it's nice to water them every day with the garden hose instead of a watering can.

We have tried 'communal planting' with multiple plants in a larger pot, but did not like the root disturbance that resulted from the separation of the plants.  This method is used by many successful growers, however, and may be right for you.  We just don't like the separation process.

The bottom line is that you should choose the method that works for you, direct sowing or indoors. whether in communal pots or individual cells.  Just, please, keep it simple!