The genus Lycoris belongs to the Amaryllidaceae family, which is native to eastern and southern Asia; most of them are found in China, and a small number in Japan and Korea (Tsi and Meerow 2000). There are more than 20 species with a broad range of flower color, leaf features, bulb size, and shape. The natural time to flower for Lycoris is from the summer to the autumn, according to the species (Ji and Meerow 2000). When they bloom, the stems are leafless, the leafless stems grow off the bulb, and there is an inflorescence in the top stem that contains four to eight blooms. After flowering, the dormant leaves are retained for a long or short period of time before the leaves start to grow. Depending on the period of growth of the leaf, the species is divided into two distinct groups. The first type of leaf grows from autumn until the spring of the following year (a short period of dormancy after the flowering). Most of these species have the typical characteristics of a spidery flower and a narrow tepal. The other type is characterized by a tubular flower; most of the species grow their leaves from spring to summer (a long dormant period after the flowering) (Cai et al. 2019). Thus, the absence of leaves in the flowering period is one of the best recognizable characteristics of Lycoris. Based on the features of flowering time, the special flower shape, and flowering in the absence of leaves, they are known in English as hurricane lily, spider lily, and surprise lily (Knox 2006). They also have various floral colors, such as red, yellow, pink, white, and multicolor. With the special shape of the flowers and abundant color, the Lycoris species are widely used as cut flowers, and planted as a garden plant. On the Amazon website (https://www.amazon.com/) and eBay (https://www.ebay.com/), the price of a bulb ranges from $1 to more than $10 depending on the species or cultivar. In general, fewer and new cultivars tend to be more expensive. Furthermore, the bulbs contain various Amaryllidaceae alkaloids, which have antitumor, antifungal, antibacterial, and antiviral functions. Galanthamine is an important alkaloid with anticholinesterase activity that has been used to treat Alzheimer’s disease, so they can also be planted as a medicinal plant (Cahlíková et al. 2020). The researchers of our institution (Institute of Botany, Jiangsu Province and Chinese Academy of Sciences) have studied Lycoris since the 1960s and have obtained many results in the field of ornamental and medicinal applications (Zhang et al. 2022a, 2022b; Zhou et al. 2020). Until now, we have established the National Flower Germplasm Resource Bank of Lycoris and reserved more than 300 germplasms. After years of research, we successfully obtained a number of new and outstanding varieties. Some have been registered on the Royal General Bulb Growers’ Association (KAVB) website in 2018 and 2021 (https://www.kavb.nl/kennisbanken/kavb-publicaties), and published (Zhang et al. 2022a).
Origin and Development
In Lycoris, interspecific hybridization events and subsequent polyploidization were considered to be the primary driving force for speciation (Kurita and Hsu 1996; Lee et al. 2001). Some of the species identified are natural hybridization populations, such as Lycoris straminea, Lycoris houdyshelii, Lycoris albiflora, and Lycoris hubeiensis (Shi et al. 2006). They inherited certain morphological traits from their parents and created their own unique ornamental traits. L. straminea is a species named with the flower color, which has very beautiful pale yellow to cream flowers, like the color of the straw post. It starts flowering in late August or early September with tall stems of spider flowers (a truly superb surprise lily). The foliage emerges in early October, green and midvein pale. It was considered a descendant of Lycoris chinensis and Lycoris radiata var. pumila (Shi et al. 2006). Because of the randomness of natural hybridization, it is easy to form a few specific traits in the next generation. In the natural habitat, we found that many populations or individual plants have a high ornamental value, such as more abundant flower colors, larger flower, and different shapes. The new cultivar, E Huang Xiao Ran, is an individual plant selected from the L. straminea natural population. It has straw-yellow flowers like the L. straminea, but also stained with pink stripes on the petals; moreover, the six stamens are also red, different from the yellow of L. straminea. In addition, it is taller than the L. straminea. The thicker stem and larger flower also make it more beautiful and suitable for cut flowers. After being selected and assessed as having a high ornamental value, we proceeded to asexual reproduction by cutting bulbs. When the small bulbs have the ability to bloom, we conducted the Distinctness, Uniformity, and Stability tests (NY/T 2510-2013, in Chinese), and the results showed that they corresponded to the demands of the new varieties. Then we named it ‘E Huang Xiao Ran’ to describe the color traits of petals and registered with the Royal General Bulb Growers’ Association (KAVB) (Edibulbcode: 9077) in 2021.
Description
The L. straminea cultivar E Huang Xiao Ran has a perennial bulb, nearly spherical in shape with black skin, 5 to 7 cm in diameter (larger than L. straminea). In early September, the stem bursts out of the ground, and grows 45 to 50 cm tall in moderate reddish-brown stems, which is the first distinguishing feature of the chartreuse stems of L. straminea (Fig. 1). Each stem bears an umbel of six to eight goose yellow flowers up to 8 cm in diameter (larger than the L. straminea) during flowering. The shape of the flower is bilaterally symmetrical, each flower has six highly reflexive tepals, 6 cm long and 0.8 cm wide, with sharp folds on the edge, and the perianth tube is ∼1 cm. The perianth lobes have pink midribs on the ventral surface and bright red midribs on the back, which do not disappear during flowering. The stamens obviously come out of the perianth, one-third longer than the perianth, the pistils are slightly longer than the stamens, and the pistils are pinkish-red. Compared with the L. straminea, this cultivar has several better characteristics with thicker and reddish-brown stems, larger bulbs and flower forms, more colorful petals with bright pink veins, and red stamens (Fig. 1A and B). As with L. straminea, the leaves are narrow, and belt-shaped emerge in autumn and then die in early summer.
Flower characteristic of Lycoris straminea and the cultivar E Huang Xiao Ran. (A) Flower characteristic of Lycoris straminea. (B) Flower characteristic of new cultivar E Huang Xiao Ran.
Citation: HortScience 58, 1; 10.21273/HORTSCI16925-22
Propagation, Cultivation, and Application
L. straminea is sterile, and has virtually no seed formation, so it is commonly propagated by asexual methods, such as cutting bulbs and plant tissue culture (Lu et al. 2002; Qing et al. 2007). These two methods can rapidly produce large numbers of asexual propagated bulbs with stable ornamental traits. Usually, a bulb can grow 12 to 16 small bulbs at the incision of the bulb by cutting method, which is less expensive and simpler than plant tissue culture. The plant tissue culture method is more useful and efficient, but it is more cost-effective and requires special facilities. The new cultivar E Huang Xiao Ran is also sterile, and both of the above propagations are applicable.
Lycoris is native to eastern and southern Asia, primarily China, where the climate is perfect for their growth. Unlike most bulbs, Lycoris has two main groups, they grow foliage from autumn or early spring of the following year, and then step into dormancy in the summer. The cultivar L. straminea E Huang Xiao Ran has foliage in autumn, which have a great ornamental value in winter. Its flowering season is in early fall in China, and it is very easy to grow in the sunshine as well as in light shade. It is well adapted with a dry and hot period in summer followed by a wet period, and can also adapt to different moisture levels and soil conditions (Salachna and Piechocki 2019). From the time stems emerge from the ground until they bloom, it generally takes 4 d, and the ornamental time of a single inflorescence keeps for a week. Thus, it is suggested that various species and cultivars plant together to have a long flowering season.
Availability
The cultivar E Huang Xiao Ran was registered with the Royal General Bulb Growers’ Association (KAVB) (Edibulbcode: 9077) in 2021. It is available through the Institute of Botany, Jiangsu Province and Chinese Academy of Sciences (Nanjing Botanical Garden Mem. Sun Yat-Sen). Contact Fengjiao Zhang (e-mail: zfjiao@yeah.net) for inquiries.
References Cited
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Cai, J., Fan, J., Wei, X. & Zhang, L. 2019 A three-dimensional analysis of summer dormancy in the red spider lily (Lycoris radiata) HortScience 54 9 1459 1464 https://doi.org/10.21273/HORTSCI14080-19
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Royal General Bulb Growers’ Association 2021 Koninklijke Algemeene Vereeniging voor Bloembollencultuur (KAVB) Hillegom, The Netherlands. https://www.kavb.nl/kennisbanken/kavb-publicaties
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Shi, S., Qiu, Y., Li, E., Wu, L. & Fu, C. 2006 Phylogenetic relationships and possible hybrid origin of Lycoris species (Amaryllidaceae) revealed by ITS sequences Biochem. Genet. 44 5 198 208 https://doi.org/10.1007/s10528-006-9023-4
Tsi, Z.H. & Meerow, A.W. 2000 Amaryllidaceae 264 Wu, C.Y. & Raven, P.H. Flora of China. Beijing Science Press and Missouri Botanical Garden Press Beijing
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