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Y! MyWebDaylilies are leafy knights of summer
Thursday, July 03, 2008
It is approaching midsummer, and daylilies are in bloom.
Daylilies have to be the perfect perennial. They grow in nearly any soil, they multiply prolifically, they bloom for a long time, they have large gorgeous flowers available in a dazzling array of colors and forms, they rarely are bothered by any sort of pest or disease, they can be moved easily, and they are so easy to grow that anyone with a small patch of soil or a large pot in a sunny area can raise them.
Daylilies are in many local garden centers — available to plant and enjoy right now. It is a great time to buy them because they can be seen before they are in full bloom — so you can see what sort of blooms they have and pick your favorites.
Some people confuse daylilies with true lilies. Daylilies are members of the Hemerocallis family. True lilies are members of the Liliaceae family. The word Hemerocallis comes from two Greek words — "hemera," meaning "day," and "kalos," meaning "beautiful." They certainly are beautiful and the flowers each do only last one day. Daylilies originally grew in Asia. They have long, lance-shaped leaves that grow in "fans." The flower's stems, called "scapes," emerge from the bottom of the clump on long, strong stems (the plants never need staking) and always bear multiple buds. Some daylilies form tiny miniature plants on the flower stem or scape. These are called "proliferations." If the proliferations are pulled off carefully and potted, they will grow roots (sometimes they already have roots) and grow into a new plant that is an exact clone of the parent. Daylilies do well in any temperature zone from Zone 1 to Zone 11 — so almost anyone in the United States or Canada can grow them. They love full sun, but sometimes will adapt to partial sun. In my experience, most daylilies do much better the more sun they receive, so I try to locate them in the sunnier areas of my garden. They prefer at least six hours of full sun.
We all are familiar with at least two types, even if you don't know their names. They are seen everywhere now.
The first is the Tawny Daylily (Hemerocallis fulva), oftentimes called the "Ditch or Roadside Lily" because it so often is seen growing in large groups in roadside ditches. It is so widespread that people often think it is a native wildflower, but actually was imported from England in the 1700s. The Tawny daylily also was often planted outside outhouses and was sometimes called the glamorous name "Outhouse Lily." The Tawny Daylily may be ordinary, but it can still be useful in gardens. When I moved into my house more than 20 years ago, there was a gravelly patch in front of my back porch that was often wet — consequently nothing would grow there, including grass. I transplanted some Tawny Daylilies that were already in my yard to this troublesome area, and they have multiplied over the years to make a large group that I truly enjoy every year when they are in bloom. When they are not in bloom, the foliage still looks nice.
The other daylily that is frequently seen is the ubiquitous rebloomer "Stella de Oro," which is used so often in landscape plantings everywhere.
Overused? Perhaps, but for public buildings and such, they do give a long period of bloom and are nearly maintenance-free once established.
