While deadheading my daylilies during the summer I come across a variety of insects that are an integral part of my garden. I thought I would share a few of them.
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 Nature's Blue Witches Brew (Story, 2010) is one of my favorite bicolor daylilies. This daylily came from my friend Sally. I love the unique smokey lavender-cream color. It is very hardy in Wisconsin and grows 38-40 inches in my garden. The flowers are four inches and they bloom from July 12 through August 7. This one is a keeper!   Our friend Patty took these photos in Tucson, Arizona. Since all we have is snow in Wisconsin, I thought I would share these sunny warm pictures. Fun fact – in the U.S. Saguaro cactus only grows in southern Arizona.  
 
  Sometimes things strike me as funny/annoying and I just thought I'd share:
Happy 2023 to you - keep it simple!  My son Shawn was in The Netherlands last week. Here are the Christmas decorations at one of the oldest cafés in Amsterdam.
 If you want to make a bold statement in the garden, here is the Oriental lily for you. With 8 inch flowers and an amazing fragrance, Dizzy grows up to 40 inches tall. Oriental lilies can be a little temperamental in zone 4 so I keep mine planted by my house for extra protection in the winter and make sure it's mulched well. Other than that, Dizzy requires very little care. I get many comments about how beautiful it is.
 Pictured are two of my favorite trimming shears. They really come in handy for fall daylily cleanup. If you have back issues like me, these shears are just what you need. The handles adjust to different lengths to limit the amount of bending over while trimming. These shears have been a lifesaver. My garden has never looked better!
FYI the shears retail for about $50 each. A perfect Christmas gift!  Rock Solid is very aptly named. It is weatherproof, reliable, and consistent. I received my plant as a division from my friend Mary. It's a prolific garden plant.
Hybridized in 2002 by Patrick Stamile, this dormant tetraploid grows 27 inches tall in my garden. Rock Solid is an early midseason bloomer that flowered from July 2 through August 4 (bud count 31–35). Blooms are almost 5 inches in size. The genetics of this daylily are so desirable that there are 181 child plants listed in the daylily database. Rock Solid is truly a sure thing! American Daylily Society Awards Award of Merit: 2011 Honorable Mention: 2008  Unbridled Spirit is one of my garden favorites. The beautiful pastel pink blends with my other flower colors and the ornate edges with teeth and hooks add visual interest.
Hybridized in Kentucky by John Rice (2007), this dormant tetraploid is very hardy in Wisconsin. Unbridled Spirit is registered as growing 33 inches tall, but in my garden it grows 40 inches plus. The blooms are 5.5 inches and are consistent and weatherproof. This daylily is a late season bloomer starting in late July and going into August. It is worthy to note that one of its parents is the famous Forestlake Ragamuffin. American Daylily Society Award: Honorable Mention 2011  First photo: A view of the city from the top of Edinburgh Castle Here is a blog I found in my files that I never posted-this is a departure from my flower topics for a change! When I visited Edinburgh, the city was beyond crazy busy! The Edinburgh Fringe Festival was in full swing. Every August, for three weeks, the city of Edinburgh welcomes artists from around the world. From big names to unknowns looking to build their careers, the festival includes theater, comedy, dance, circus, cabaret, children's shows, musicals, opera, music, spoken word, exhibitions, and events. The performers are scattered throughout the entire city. This made for some interesting people-watching. The historic Edinburgh Castle was also a very memorable experience. A castle has been on this location since the 12th Century, built on volcanic rock. (A photo of the castle on the rock shown below.) It is the UK's second most-visited paid tourist attraction. I was fortunate to attend the Edinburgh Military Tattoo performance on the castle esplanade in beautiful weather (people at the previous night's performance sat in pouring rain). There were 8,000+ spectators in attendance from dozens of countries on the evening I was there. The performance was amazing! I had never seen anything quite like this before. The sound of over a hundred bagpipes playing together will always stay with me.    A typical Edinburgh street. Note the soot-covered buildings. Most of Edinburgh's classic Gothic and Georgian buildings remain coated in a black residue from the industrial revolution. An attempt was made to clean the buildings, but cleaning them did additional damage to the brickwork, so the effort was abandoned.  Jedburgh Abbey, the ruins of an Augustinian abbey which was founded in the 12th century, located on the Scottish borders, about 10 miles north of England.  A 1920 anchor from the Russian cruiser Varyag at Lendalfoot, Ayrshire, Scotland
 Shocking is one of my late season Orienpet hybrid lilies. It is truly a show stopper with its large 6 to 12 inch blooms and heavenly fragrance. Shocking is a cross between an oriental lily and a trumpet lily. It is hardy in zones four through seven, grows 4 and 1/2 feet tall and typically blooms from mid to late July into August. Orienpets like full sun to part shade and they adapt to most soils very well. If you want some big impact in your garden, this stunner is for you!     My garden has been been cleaned up for fall. The flowerbeds have been weeded, the plants have been trimmed and tomato cages I have been placed over the daylilies to protect them from deer that roam through our yard. It's not the greatest curb appeal, but it works! Thank you to Tara, Jade, Blake, Lois, Lori, Ryan, and Trina for all of their hard work. I am so grateful and appreciative.
  My friend Mary was watching TV in her living room one evening. After a long day of gardening work she fell asleep in her recliner. She woke up suddenly, hearing a "PLOP… PLOP… PLOP… PLOP" on her laminate floor. She jumped out of her chair wondering what the heck that noise was. Oddly enough, a toad was sitting by her front door as if it was asking to go outside--certainly not your usual house guest! Mary quickly opened her front door and the toad jumped outside into the bushes.
About 48 hours prior, Mary brought in a couple of beautiful annual pots from outside to overwinter in her sun room. Earlier, she noticed that a toad had been sitting in her pot outside. It appeared to be gone on the day she brought her annual plant pots inside. Next year, Mary plans to bring her plant pots into the garage for a day or so before they come into the house, just to make sure there are no toads residing in the dirt!  About 25 years ago I received Spanish Glow as a freebie plant with one of my daylily orders. Believe it or not, I ended up liking Spanish Glow way more than the daylilies I actually ordered. Dozens of daylilies have come and gone in my garden, but Spanish Glow has remained. Hybridized by Jeff Salter in 1988, this semi-evergreen tetraploid grows 26 to 28 inches tall with a 5 inch bloom. The soft pastel peach is lovely. It is a mid-late season bloomer, that blooms from July through August. Spanish Glow is a perfect garden plant...beauty plus performance! American Dayliliy Society Award: 1992 Honorable Mention    Toronto is one of my best finds ever! Not far from my office there is a large plant nursery. Needless to say, I spent many lunch hours looking at their plants. At the end of the season they would put out bargain tables. In one particular plant pot there were two solitary sticks poking out of the dirt. There was a plant tag in the pot of a gorgeous Asiatic Lily. I thought I would take a risk and try it out hoping that it wasn't a misplaced plant tag. I was tickled when the plant bloomed the following year and looked even more beautiful than the tag. I grew Toronto in a flower bed mixed in with daylilies in the backyard. I loved the unusual vibrant color so much that last year we moved it close to our back door. I get so many compliments about how beautiful this lily is.    Stranger in a Strange Land is one of my newer daylilies. I had an empty spot in our brick retaining wall. I wanted a smaller, purple, late bloomer; and this daylily checked all of the boxes. Hybridized in 2011 by Karol Emmerich, this Minnesota daylily grows very well in Wisconsin. It grows with five inch blooms, between 22 and 24 inches tall, and begins blooming towards late July and well into August. It is sunfast and consistent in addition to being beautiful. It was a perfect addition to our tiered retaining wall.
 Now that October is right around the corner, it's time to prepare my flowerbeds for winter. One task I don't have to do is store my whimsy in the garage or basement. My garden decor is mostly cast iron antiques that remain outside year round. Easy peasy! Here are a few photos of my decorative antiques. 
  Here is another of my favorite orange daylilies, Screamcicle. Hybridized by Pat Cochenour in 2003, this dormant tetraploid grows 35 inches tall and has a large 8 inch bloom. It is an early midseason bloomer, usually starting in early July. Categorized as an unusual form crispate, this daylily is a great performer in my Wisconsin garden with a bud count of 26-30.
American Daylily Society Awards: Award of Merit: 2014 Honorable Mention: 2009  Look what we discovered...a turkey family taking a dust bath in our dirt pile. Turkeys dust their feathers every day if possible. This helps to remove mites and lice. Birds also dust bathe to prevent their feathers from being saturated with excess preening oil, and to remove dry flakes of skin. This was a rare sight we had never witnessed before.
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