1926] stout: lilium tigrinum 277 



apparently wild at Killing, obtained by Dean J. L. Buck, of the 

 University of Nanking, China. About half of these various 

 lilies have lived to bloom. Many pollinations were made, both 

 of individual flowers and from flower to flower on difi^erent plants. 

 In no case did a capsule even start to develop. In the first years 

 of study the bulblets were not allowed to develop in the axils of 

 leaves for a number of the plants. In these tests the entire 

 race of tiger lilies has been entirely self- and intra-sterile. This 

 behavior is quite in agreement with the many reports that the 

 tiger lilies have been fruitless. The results of the experimental 

 studies confirm the observations of the gardeners. 



IS THE TIGER LILY A GOOD SPECIES OR MERELY A CLONAL VARIETY? 



Since the tiger lilies do not produce seeds to any sort of pol- 

 lination among themselves there is no seed that can be used to 

 propagate their kind. They yield seeds only to cross-pollination 

 with different types of lilies and this gives hybrids different from 

 the tiger parent. The evidence indicates that the tiger lilies 

 have always been propagated exclusively from daughter bulbs 

 and the stem bulblets. If this be the case, then the tiger lilies 

 do not constitute a good species breeding true from seed, but 

 merely a clonal strain or variety. 



Such a variety has its beginning as a single seedling which is 

 ever afterward propagated vegetatively. In the case of the 

 tiger lily this seedling may have been a hybrid or it may have been 

 a variant from some other type of lily now extinct or perhaps con- 

 sidered as a distinct species. 



There is, however, a possibility that the tiger lilies do not 

 constitute a single clonal group and that further search may dis- 

 cover different clonal strains that are cross-compatible. A col- 

 lection of tiger lilies from widely separated localities in Japan and 

 China would allow one to make more satisfactory tests for this 

 than have thus far been possible. It is even possible that there 

 are localities in China where tiger lilies are really wild and propa- 

 gating by seed. 



THE TYPE OF STERILITY IN THE TIGER LILIES 



The flowers of the tiger lilies, excepting only the double 

 flowered form with its aborted pistils, are perfect. The pistils 

 are able to develop into capsules. The pollen is highly viable 



