[pbs] tulip color breaking
Jane McGary
janemcgary at earthlink.net
Mon Feb 2 13:58:21 EST 2009
Color breaking and other deformities in Trillium have been attributed
to mycoplasma infection. The Rock Garden Quarterly published an
article about this several years ago.
As for tulips, some wild tulip species are strikingly marked, and
this apparently non-viral character has been exploited in the
breeding of feathered, flamed, striped, and similar commercial
varieties. However, this doesn't mean that Dutch tulips are safe to
plant around virus-free lilies, because some plants (including some
lilies, as was recently noted about L. lancifolium) can harbor virus
for many years without showing overt symptoms -- the virus can,
however, be diagnosed with a lab test. Another good reason to grow
your bulbs from seed!
And no, I can't guarantee my bulbs are virus-free, sorry. My garden
has some commercial bulbs in it that have been there for many years,
though the sale bulbs almost all come from the frames, which are a
little distance away, and I don't have any imported lilies. There
are, however, very few aphids in the garden or frames, and these are
the usual vector for plant viruses.
Jane McGary
At 10:08 AM 2/2/2009, you wrote:
>Jim McKenney wrote:
> > In a conversation during EWSW09 the topic of color breaking in tulips came
> > up. I was assured that it was caused by mycoplasma, not viruses.
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