LILIES - RHS Lily Group

The conservation of wild lily
populations in Japan
For many years Katsuro Arakawa has been a major donor to the
Lily Group’s seed distribution scheme. Here, he describes the
conservation work he is involved with in Japan.
Y FIRST CONTACT with the RHS Lily Group was in the winter of 1989, when
MI
was building the collection of live lilies at Yurigahara Park in Sapporo. I
remember my excitement at the inspiring present of goodly amount of various
lily seeds from the Group’s seed distribution in the spring of 1990.
I owe many salutary lessons to this seed exchange – and not just that, but it
has also brought me new friends in diverse corners of the world. I have had great
pleasure from imagining each person’s gardening life, from the letters and emails
they send me.
Since spring 1996, we have organised our own domestic seed distribution,
here in Japan. And our own Lily Society has now been established, grown from
the initial nucleus of lily lovers brought into contact with each other through our
domestic seed distribution. Some members are on the staff of botanic gardens,
in charge of their lily collections. Our seed distribution helps to avoid inbreeding
problems such as loss of vigour, and is a valuable fallback resource if and when
strains are accidentally lost. The same of course is true of the RHS Lily Group’s
distribution, and seeds which we are able to supply to that distribution seem to
play the same role.
Our Lily Society prints The Lily Society News in spring and autumn, and organises
a Lily Tour in the flowering season. We have visited the World Lily Gardens at
Yurigahara Park, private lily breeders, agricultural institutes in Hokkaido, and the
natural habitats of Lilium dauricum and L. japonicum. In 2006 the Lily Society
held a programme of lily lectures to celebrate its fifth anniversary.
We plan to hold such lectures every five years, and major topics for us will be
the history of relationships between human beings and lilies, and the fragrance of
lilies. It is 175 years since L. speciosum was taken back by Siebold and flowered
for the first time in Europe. We have long been aware of the beauty of the
lily’s form and colouring, and now find great value too in its fragrance. There
is also growing interest in the importance of the fragrance to the relationship
between the lily and its pollinators, and in its relevance to perfume manufacture.
Fragrant lilies like L. alexandrae, L. auratum, L. japonicum, L. nobilissimum and
L. rubellum are Japanese endemics. Adding L. longiflorum, six species out of 14
native to Japan are fragrant.
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