RE: Pink & yellow

 I was wondering how the gene(s) for pink aren't getting all the carrotine to stop at the lycopene stage.  
 Also, I read that the chloroplasts, to do photosynthese, require the yellow form of the pigment.  So is there a seperate gene(s) for the pigment in the flower vs. in the leaves?  Or does the gene(s) that stop the pigment at the pink stage only function in the flowers, not in the leaves?
 What are the results of pink-yellow blends crossed with the purest pinks?
 The complexity of what is going on here blows me away.
 WAlter

It is indeed tricky.  To start with the iris has almost all of its pigment in epidermis. My understanding that this is not true for all flowers. Not much colour in mesophyll. The leaves are the oposite, the pigmentaton is in the mesophyl and not much colour in epidermis. Actually, PBF colouration is in epidermis of the stem. 
The original pinks had a lot of bleed through of carotene and original pinks were more apricot and melon and only over time has this been cleaned up. Look at the melon and apricot daylillies. they are mainly lycopene with some  xanthophylls etc (byproduct of carotene) and look much like early pink iris in colouration.
Plants can, and do have genes that turn off pigment  production in certain organs (leaves eg) or in parts of organs. Plant cells have plastids that are in cytoplasm. they can be diferentiated into different forms. Chloroplasts contain chlorophyll are found in leaves and in flowers these plastids are developed into chromoplasts, and contain the cartenoid pigmnents. There is a few exceptions but it takes too long to explain it all. 
Orange iris are a good example of a balance of a yellow oil based pigment exsisting togetherwith lycopene. Uunder high magnification of an epidermal peel of a flower, the plastids seem to be abnormal.  I have sent these photos to a few plants scientists but no clear answer yet. I hava a few experiments plannned to test further. This yellow pigment  in orange is the same as seen in yellows with tangerine beard and is a recessive gene characteristic. The exact combination of peach, orange, melon, apricot etc. may vary from flower to flower. If the yellow is of the recessive type, it won't show up in a cross with a pure pink unless the pink is a carrier. If it is a bleed through from the lycopne blockage, then it is dominant and a lot of offspring will have this.

Aren't you glad you asked?

Chuck Chapman 

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