Eary Morning Stroll

 

 

Each summer we look forward to the time that the daylilies begin to reach peak bloom. I don't think we are quite there but we are very very close. The beds are loaded with blooms. It is wonderful to just walk through the beds early each day to see what is blooming.

 

 

 

It is always a joy to see the first blooms of a new addition to the garden. Often we purchase based on photos we have seen, sometimes it is after seeing the plant in another garden. But you are never sure if it will be exactly the same in the conditions that exist in your garden. Below are the first blooms on No Boys Allowed and I could not be more pleased with this one.

 

H. No Boys Allowed

 

 

 

 

H. Intelligent Design

 

'Intelligent Design is in its second bloom season here and the blooms are better than they were last year. With the ample moisture and cooler temperatures there are so many more buds than last year.

 

H. Bark At Me

 

I always enjoy seeing the unusual forms bloom. I love the long petals that twist and curl. 'Bark At Me' is an older daylily with a 7.5" bloom.

 

H. White Chocolate

 

Another fairly new addition to the garden, 'White Choclate' was also catching my attention this morning. It's a 7" white flower with a green throat also classified as an unusual form. It is loaded with buds so I will get to enjoy it for quite a while.

 

 

 

I finish my stroll with a look at a newer bed of daylilies. This bed was created in the fall of  2011 as I divided older clumps of daylilies from another part of the garden. As I find companion plants that do well planted with daylilies I will be adding them to the beds. We added a phlox, a few lily bulbs and verbena to this bed. The verbena reseeds and I let a lot of it bloom where it wants.

 

Hope you have time to stroll through the garden and enjoy the blooms.

 

Sue Ellen



Seeing Double

H. 'Peggy Jeffcoat',  Joiner-J,  1995 

Daylily blooms can have many forms such as this double. From the AHS daylily dictionary:

"A double flower has more than one petal whorl (hose-in-hose), or a stamen whorl that contains petaloid (petal-like) stamens (peony type double)."

H.'Condilla', Grooms, 1977

There are about 35 daylilies in my collection that are classified as doubles.

H. 'Cardigan Bay', Trimmer, 1996

Some have so many of the extra petals or petaloid tissue that the stamens are not easily seen.

H. 'Lemonberry Truffle', Kirchhoff-D, 2000

There may times when a daylily that is classified as a double does not produce the extra petaloid tissue and it will bloom as a single. This cultivar lists in its registration data that it doubles 94% of the time.

Miniature Daylilies

H. Baby Jessie (Eller-N  2005)

We attended the annual Mid Winter Symposium in Nashville last week. One of the sessions that I really enjoyed focused on the miniature and small daylilies. I checked my database and found that I grow only 16 of the miniature daylilies. When I checked for pictures, I found only one. I will have to remedy that when this bloom season starts.

 According to the information in the AHS database this cultivar was registered at 18" high with a bloom size of 2.75" and that it doubles 80% of the time.

There were so many beautiful ones shown at the meeting that I will be looking for a few more of these to add to the garden especially some of the ones with eyes that are a shade of blue.