I visited an online forum and was relieved to see I was not the only person that had experienced this problem. Some folks said they had bought the same plant three times because they knew people in their zone that grew it successfully. Others moved their plant around numerous times until it was happy. Some folks bought the same plant twice, but the second time they bought it from a different source and the second time the plant did wonderfully.
An issue of concern could be whether the plant is a division or has been tissue cultured. It is always better to purchase from a reliable source that you know are divisions. Tissue culture plants may grow well, but more than likely may not. Blog on tissue culture
Bottom line, with more than 95,000 daylily varieties available I wouldn’t put up with these problems for too long because it is easy enough to find another daylily that is more than willing to grow happily in your garden.
Pictured: Mississippi Red Dragon, a dormant daylily that was very temperamental for me. I knew other gardeners that grew this plant in my zone with no problem whatsoever. My plant was definitely a division. Go figure?