the seedlings will come entirely true to color. There is still too much hybrid 
quality in them. Further selection and inbreeding, with future hybrid crossing, such 
as has been done with snapdragons and corn, may produce the great race of 
Amaryllis we are all waiting for, the Amaryllis of the future. There is the greatest 
chance for every amateur and professional plant scientist in this. The results of 
inbreeding in Amaryllis are not well understood. It has been said that it encourages 
weaknesses in the strain. 
Amaryllis Breeding 
Every Amaryllis grower can become a plant hybridizer and a plant scientist of 
modest attainments in a few years by using the best stock available and exercising 
his best intelligence in the genetical and horticultural problems which he or she 
will meet in the breeding of new Amaryllis hybrids. 
All this is besides the fun and fame that can come to a grower of fine Hybrid 
Amaryllis in any community of America, where the cult of the Amaryllis and other 
Amaryllids is growing apace, and soon may become the next great plant enthusiasm 
of the nation’s flower lovers. 
Amaryllis seed can be grown in sterilized sandy loam, leaf mold and sand, or in 
vermiculite. We make seedbeds of sandy loam in our lath houses, and fertilize 
now and then with some good soluble fertilizer like Hy-Gro. In six months to a 
year the seedlings will be large enough to transplant to their permanent beds under 
lath shade or in the open garden if conditions are favorable, as in the lower South. 
In the North, they can be transplanted into 4 inch pots or into flats spaced 4 inches 
apart, and later moved to five or six inch pots to bloom. With continuous good 
culture, the bulbs may be brought into bloom in three years or four, occasionally in 
two. Some bulbs will be slower than others, and may not bloom in three or four 
years. It is better to discard these seedlings if they have had every advantage 
otherwise, as the Amaryllis trade needs quick-growing stock. Plant seeds flat or 
vertical, 4% inch deep in soil. 
Amaryllis bulbs as purchased from the grower or dealer may or may not have 
roots attached. Some of the bulbs received from European firms have the roots 
removed or dried up. The same with most bulbs sold by American growers. There 
is a difference of opinion when to pot up the bulbs, but they are usually recommended 
to be potted immediately on receipt. This will permit the bulb to make a new root 
system and become established before blooming, if conditions are favorable and if it 
is that kind of bulb. 
Slow Rooting 
Some bulbs refuse to make new root systems until growth starts in the spring at 
the time the bloom scape appears. The English and Holland growers recommend 
starting the pots over a brisk bottom heat, about 75-77 degrees, as a hot-bed of 
tanbark or horse manure in a warm atmosphere. Possibly a heating coil arrange- 
ment would be satisfactory, buried in the medium in which the pots are sunk to the 
rims. In the ground, far South, newly transplanted bulbs soon make new root 
systems and bloom well the same season. In fact, at Lakemont Gardens we have 
had little trouble transplanting bulbs at any time of year provided the root systems 
are not seriously disturbed. 
But in shipping Amaryllis bulbs to the consumer, the bulbs are usually sold 
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