Nice flowers! Thanks for sharing. Should I say all these varieties are going to keep me going for years! Again, I need to be patient. :D -GM

Hi Hatta,

Lovely photos - thank you!

Since you only have three flowers to work with, I would choose the two known diploids (i.e., H. puniceum and Mrs. Garfield). For the third flower, I would try 'Tosca' because it is simply luscious and my guess is that it is also diploid.

Please remember that this is only my opinion. Whatever you choose to do, I wish you good luck!

Best regards,

Blanca

Chico is really cool looking flowers!
Tosca is a beaty for sure.

Thanks for sharing this lovely flower.
Chico is a perfect example of everything that I love about the cybisters, their spidery form and the waxy petals are just lovely!

Very lovely, Hatta! I hope you're able to get seed pods! Some flowers are so picky about who they mate with! LOL!

Really nice photos! Thank you for sharing!

Pretty flowers!
Hatta, do not care for ploidity and compatibility, respectively. Simply pollinate all flowers (of, ummh, other Knight Star Lilies) you can get (be aware not to perform accidental self pollinations) and observe the fortcomings. In the reciprocal case however (H.cybister "Chico" as seed producer) you should decide more strategically and use but the pollen from DIPs because you have only 4 flowers on hand. I assume that "Tosca" is a DIP - and I presume that H.puniceum is a TET. Gervase is a TET, too, for sure.

If I were at your place I should definitely pollinate all the 4 flowers with "Mrs. Garfield" (DIP) - that is one combination I have the very strongest vision of "obtaining the most spectacular progeny"!!!
If you selfpollinate "Chico" then you must be aware that this project either fails completely, or the seed pod will contain very few seeds, often less than 10. This is at least my personal experience. AND you must conside that "Chico" is an outstanding clone of a species Amaryllis, carefully selected and released (by the breeder Fred Meyer) and this means that you would have to raise hundreds of seedlings after selfing in order to achieve a clone which is superior. On the other hand ummmmmmmmmmmmh... *g*.... I admit that the meaning of superiority is not an absolute category but might instead be strongly related to the person who performs the selection and that is, guess that, it is YOU - and you might actually find a specimen extremely attractive which is of little value according to commercial criteriums.

Thanks everybody! After seeing with my own eyes, no doubt, 'Chico' is the loveliest of them all! It has the characteristics that make it worth staring at from all angles, all day!

Blanca, thanks for sharing your thoughts on x-pollination. That's also what I had in mind! Great thinkers think alike! LOL!

Sr Hans, I am blushing! The great Sir Hans gives a comment on my posting! Thanks a lot, and I am so over the moon!

Yes, I will use 'Chico' pollens on all my other available flowers irrespective of the ploidities!

As for 'Chico' being seed producer, yesterday I dusted 1 flower with with Tosca pollens and another 1 with the orange Puniceum's pollens! After reading your remarks on the low success rate of a selfed 'Chico', I will now dust the 2 remaining flowers with 'Mrs Garfield' pollens! Pls pray with me that all will take!

'Mrs Garfield' is wonderful - great multiplier, nice white color with pronounced pinked/red veins, frequent blooms, variegated leaves and is evergreen. But all my 'Mrs Garfield' pollination (either selfed or crossed) attempts so far failed.

Now, imagine what the cross will be like between 'Chico' and 'Mrs Garfield'!

On ploidities, has anyone got a complete (or close to complete) list?

Hatta

Chico is special.

My Mrs Garfield pollination failed too. The seed pods just dried up and died.

Last year my Chico did produce one pod. Sadly, don't know what it was crossed with. More sadly, is the fact that I accidently gave the seeds away. It has a scape forming now, so will try again.

Just a quick update that the pollination on all 4 'Chico' flowers. I use fresh pollens direct from the anthers to have a higher chance of taking. For 'Mrs Garfield', I requested the pollens from my neighbor who happened to have a pot of blooming 'Mrs Garfield'.

What will the crosses be like ?
'Chico' x 'Tosca'
'Chico' x Puniceum (orange)
'Chico' x 'Mrs Garfield' - flower 1
'Chico' x 'Mrs Garfield' - flower 2

... and now the waiting has begun! Isn't this exciting? I hope that none will abort.

Hatta

I wish you much success, Hatta! The crosses sound like lovely matches!