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Abstract
The effects of a 63° period of development prior to cooling on the forcing of Lilium longiflorum were compared with precooling treatments. Different bulb sizes of ‘Ace’ and ‘Nellie White’ lilies were used. It was found that a growing period at 63° prior to cooling significantly increased the number of leaves and floral buds. It had no consistent effect on the number of days to flower or final plant height.
With the ‘Ace’ lily, the greatest number of floral buds was observed with a treatment of 3 weeks at 63° followed by 5 weeks at 38°. Within a single bulb size, the ‘Ace’ lily produced more floral buds, was a taller plant, and had more leaves than ‘Nellie White’. The number of leaves and floral buds increased with an increase in bulb size regardless of the type of low temperature treatment or cultivar used.
Abstract
Potted ‘Ace’ lily bulbs were treated with gibberellic acid (GA3) as a soil drench using varying concentrations, numbers of applications and at different stages of development. There was no consistent effect on the forcing days to flower, plant height or the number of leaves, however, specific treatments with 1000 ppm significantly reduced the number of floral buds initiated. It appears that the most sensitive stage of application is that period just prior to flower initiation and that the GA3 must be applied at this time in order to reduce the number of floral buds initiated. A preliminary experiment indicated that GA4+7 was more effective than GA3. GA4+7 influenced plant height and leaf length as well as the number of floral buds but had no effect on the forcing days to flower.