Daylilies Today

Mati Hari (Brooks 1981)

Here’s a selection of daylilies blooming today.

Hold Your Horses (Trimmer 2004)

Bill Norris (Kirchhoff 1993)

Big Smile (Apps 1999)

Brookwood Lee Causey (Sharp 1998)

Earth Angel (Stamile 1987)

Northern Fancy (Stamile 2002)

Moonlight Orchid (Talbott 1986)

Galena Gilt Edge (Blocher)

Inky Fingers (Stamile 2000)

Handsome Prince (Couturier 1993)

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Happy Faces

Country Melody (Klehm 1987)

I love the spring season in the garden, when new growth is everywhere. It’s very exciting and inspiring. But for brilliant, happy, boisterous colour, there is nothing like the midsummer daylily season. These easy-care no-fuss perennials come in a wide range of colors and shapes and sizes, and brighten the garden for weeks. As each individual flower blooms for just one day, every morning brings a new bouquet. Here are some of the daylilies blooming right now. Each flower is labeled with its name, hybridizer, and the year the hybrid was registered with the American Hemerocallis Society.

Angelic Grin (Joiner 1992)

Giggle Creek (Culver 2000)

Ghost of Thunder Road (Hanson 2001)

Cameroons (Munson 1984) with Chance Encounter (Stamile 1994)

Serena Dancer (Marshall 1986)

New Series (Carpenter 1982)

Key West (Trimmer 1999)

Karen’s Curls (Reinke 1997)

Big Smile (Apps 1999)

Mata Hari (Brooks 1981)

Troubled Sleep (Hanson 1998)

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Daylilies Today: July 6th

Daylily season, long-awaited, is getting underway. A few daylilies have been blooming for a week or so now. Coyote Moon (Hybridizer: Kirchhoff Registered: 1994) was new to the garden last year and has really settled in well. It has plenty of buds and produces very pretty, nicely shaped yellow flowers touched with cinnamon.

Suzy Wong (Kennedy 1962) is an older cultivar. The flowers don’t have the substance of many newer daylilies, but I like its fresh, lemony yellow. It is very floriferous, producing many buds over the daylily season.

Pixie Parasol (Hudson 1975) has also been blooming for a while. It was the first daylily to bloom this year. Like Suzy Wong, I moved Pixie Parasol from my previous garden. I saved it, in part, because I think its name fits it so well.

Femme de Joie (Hayward 1979) is another old favorite that suits its name. The flowers really do look joyful. It tends to have weak scapes that let the heavy flowers droop, but it is holding up well so far this year.

Born Yesterday (Lambert 1972) always reminds me of my children when they were newborns. We have been getting some much-needed showers today, and I just dashed out and snapped a few photos during a brief interlude. The flowers are touched with raindrops.

I moved Broken Heart (Kroll 1993) to a sunnier spot in the garden and it has suffered a bit of a setback from transplanting. However, it is still gamely producing a few flowers.

Yesterday Memories (Spalding 1976) is a very pretty, unassuming pink that always does well. This was its first bloom this year.

Big Smile (Apps 1999) always makes me smile. I like its understated pale yellow, with white ribs and just a touch of pink on the petal edges, a very cheerful, good-natured look. I moved this plant in the spring too, and unlike Broken Heart, it seems very happy with the move. It settled right in and is blooming better this year than it did the last few years in a shadier location.

Finally, here are two spidery flowers, Curly Rosy Posy (Hansen 1992) above, and Eggplant Escapade (Reed 1996) below. The season is off to a good start.

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Summer on my Mind

The warmer temperatures make you believe that spring is just around the corner. I have been thinking of my summer garden and browsing through my photographs from last July, when the daylilies were in full bloom. What glorious colours! Above is a close up of Cameroons, while below is the aptly named Big Smile.

Check out the little crab spider on one of these Eggplant Escapade blooms. Can you see it?

And here is the brilliant face of Scarlet Poppy.

This week, I slipped a couple of orders for daylilies in the mail. Canada has a number of excellent daylily suppliers. One of my orders went to Nottawasaga Daylilies, near Creemore, Ontario. I hope to see the pretty pink face of Banned in Boston blooming in my garden this summer. This photograph is from the Nottawasaga photo gallery.

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Pretty Faces

The first two weeks of July mark the zenith of the daylily season. The plants that were on the cusp of blooming when I left for vacation were in bloom by the time I returned five days later. Daylilies (hemerocallis) are straight-forward plants. Not for them the fussing and fretting of garden prima donnas. Although they prefer full sun and moderate moisture, they will bloom, albeit on a less flamboyant scale, in shade or in drought, in good soil or poor. They are quite pest-free. Unlike the old species daylily from which they were developed (sometimes called the Ditch Lily or Orange Daylily), modern hybrids don’t spread rambunctiously, but form neat clumps. The clumps may need dividing every few years. How quickly they multiply depends on factors such as the quality of the soil and the climate. Here is a selection of photographs of some of the daylilies that are blooming in my garden today.

Prague Spring

Galena Gilt Edge and Helter Skelter

Born Yesterday (This one always reminds me of my three new baby daughters!)

Big Smile

Hurricane Sky and Fencing Master with roses and campanula

Pure and Simple

Asterisk

Rococo

Seminole Ruby

Helter Skelter

Suzy Wong

Angelic Grin

Geneva Firetruck

Yesterday Memories

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