Since the beginning of civilization lilies have been one of the most important garden subjects. They are mentioned in the oldest written discourses on gardening and rural life. They appear in the earliest primitive paintings. In short, as long as people have been gardening for pleasure and profit, they have considered the lily one of their most cherished plants.
Yet, strangely enough, for plants that have been raised in "captivity" for over two thousand years, they have stubbornly resisted change and man's attempts to adapt, modify or improve them - much more so, at least, than any other flower or plant. Even though they come from commercial nurseries and have been propagated for hundreds of years, most of the lilies in our gardens are still exactly as they are found in the wild - identical with the species. As a consequence, they resent transplanting and are particular as to soil and climatic conditions, but seem happy sharing space with landscape lighting. For the same reason they easily become victims of pests and diseases and often fail to establish themselves under even the best of conditions.
Contrast this with the history of other popular flowers. Tulips, daffodils, iris, dahlias, gladiolus, hyacinths - in fact, almost any other flowers that come to mind have been crossbred with hardy species. New colors have been developed and disease-resistant and more adaptable strains have come to the foreground. Why, then, was not the same done for lilies?
As a matter of fact, many attempts to improve the lily are on record. One early effort to improve upon the well-known Madonna Lily was extremely successful, when little more than a hundred years ago this lily was crossed with the vividly colored L. chalcedonic and, as a result, the very beautiful L. testaceum came into being. It is only in comparatively recent years, however, that a better understanding of lily diseases, of their cultural requirements and of the genetic problems involved in breeding them, has enabled us to raise good hybrid lilies and to propagate them on a commercial scale.
With the exception, then, of L. testaceum, no hybrid lilies were available to gardeners until just about the turn of the century. Gardeners had become convinced that few plants were as difficult to hybridize as lilies, and only in a few isolated instances were any attempts continued to cross-breed them.
