Oriental Lily Tissue Culture Somatic Embryogenesis

Oriental lilies (Lilium) are famous for their extremely fragrant, very large, outward-facing, flattened flowers. They are widely used for landscaping and indoor decoration, and are very easy to grow. Three famous varieties are raspberry spotting Muscadet, red Stargazer and white Casa Blanca. Oriental lilies bloom from mid-summer through early fall and grow very well in USDA Zones 4 - 9. We have tested different explant regeneration systems with oriental lily ‘Muscadet’ and established an efficient somatic embryogenesis system using in vitro bulb scale explants.  Somatic embryos developed directly from near end of the explant, with a mean number of 3 somatic embryos obtained per explant. Regenerated somatic embryos were matured on plantlet strength medium after 30 days. The well-developed plantlets were directly transplanted to peat moss: perlite: vermiculite (1:1:1) soil and kept under moisture in the greenhouse for acclimatization, a 100% survival rate was obtained after 25 days of acclimatization.