Every fall I make a point of giving my daylilies what I call their 'medical' checks. I like to examine each individual plant, pull out any weeds, determine that no moles have tunneled under or around them, and make sure that squirrels haven't buried any walnuts close by. When I do checkups I occasionally find a proliferation on an old daylily scape.

"A proliferation is a leafy shoot from a node or bract found on scapes of many cultivars. Small roots often form and occasionally a flower is produced while the proliferation is still on the scape. (Definition from the American Daylily Society.)

For those of you who are unfamiliar with daylilies, their seeds are not identical to either parent plant. A proliferation is one way to get an exact replica of the plant you have (in addition to plant division). I have had good results growing daylilies from proliferations. In fact, I have huge daylily clumps growing in my garden that started with just one tiny proliferation! It's also a fun way to share plants with friends.

When I find a proliferation I cut the scape off of the plant and place it in a plastic cup of water to grow roots. I have found that the roots will grow quicker if you use a clear plastic cup (as opposed to an opaque one). Important: Be sure to keep the water in the cup clean. The roots generally grow large enough to plant in a week or two.  I like to leave a good portion of the scape on both sides of the plant. When I eventually plant the proliferation in dirt, the scape gives the tender new daylily stability. The scape above the dirt will eventually dry up and fall off. I leave my proliferations in a pot for a few weeks to form roots, and from there I place it in the ground. In two or three years the proliferations pictured will bloom and look exactly like the beautiful 'Red Volunteer' pictured in the first photo. 

I have grown 'Red Volunteer' ever since I can remember having daylilies. It is reliable, consistent, big, tall, and gorgeous. In addition to other awards, Red Volunteer won the 'Lenington All-American Award' in 2004, which goes to one daylily each year voted the best performer over a wide geographic area. This midseason, dormant tetraploid was hybridized by William Oakes and introduced in 1984.   My plant grows 38" tall and the blooms are 7" or more in size. It is a definite wow! There will always be a place for Red Volunteer in my garden.

These little creatures visited my garden for quite a while before I found out they were not a type of hummingbird – they were actually a moth! The hummingbird moth in the photo is a 'Hemaris Clearwing' (the most common kind). Your chances of seeing them are better if you grow Phlox, Bee Balm, Butterfly Bush, Honeysuckle and/or Verbena in your yard.

Hummingbird moths are more plump than hummingbirds, and grow approximately two inches long. The Clearwings are usually a reddish brown/olive color. Like hummingbirds, these moths make humming sounds when they hover around flowers. What makes them unusual is that they have a very long tongue that they keep rolled up under their chin; when they unroll their tongue they can reach nectar inside flowers that many other insects can't.

The females lay their eggs on plants, usually on the underside of the leaves. The caterpillars are green, so they blend in with the foliage. When they are fully-grown they drop to the ground and spin a loose cocoon. The pupa spends the winter well hidden and the adult emerges the following spring. In northern climates there is only one generation per year.

The white garden phlox pictured is 'David.'
Credit for the photography goes to my husband Ange
Credit for the hummingbird moth information: butterflywebsite.com

It's mid-September and I only have three daylilies still in bloom. Due to the rain we've had recently, I was unable to spray deer deterrent regularly and the deer managed to eat some scapes of my late bloomers. But I am happy to report that for some odd reason the deer spared 'Suzy Cream Cheese.' This award-winning spider daylily is a late-season bloomer I would never be without!

Suzy Cream Cheese was hybridized in Ohio by Dan Bachman (who was possibly a Frank Zappa fan back in the day?) Suzy started blooming on August 21 and is still in bloom today. The flowers are an impressive 7" in size and the plant grows about 35" tall. The scapes always remain upright and never bend or droop. The flowers have good substance and the hot sun doesn't bother them a bit. Both of these photos were taken late in the afternoon on a 90 degree day. Suzy is a dormant diploid that thrives in Wisconsin. If you are a northern gardener and want lots of late-season bloom, Suzy Cream Cheese is a gotta-have.

When I look at photos of my daylilies, I notice many details that I don't otherwise see on my garden walk-throughs. In fall I enjoy taking the time to review all the photos I've taken throughout the summer and revisit bloom season through my camera's lens. This year I made a point to get more up-close photos to capture the minutiae of each bloom.

My cover girl this week is "Mexican Magic." This cultivar has a most unique and pleasing color combination of pale orange and purple with a deeper orange throat, plus the delicate ruffled purple edge adds a perfect finishing touch! As striking as this particular daylily is, I think every daylily is beautiful in their own special way. I posted a few photos below just to prove my point.

Daylilies pictured after Mexican Magic are: Bluegrass Music, Man of Sorrows, Sabine Baur, Wild Child, Magnificent Rainbow, Nip Me, and J.T. Davis.

In spring, a kitty we had never seen before started patrolling our little piece of paradise. It was hard to miss him with his snowy white fur and ginger spots. Talk about skills; this stinker scaled the trees like a squirrel! He also liked to check out the inside perimeter of our garage for mice. Some days, he followed me around the garden, curious about what I was doing.

Here's the funny part...there are actually THREE of these guys, and they all look quite similar. I did a triple take the first time I saw all three of them together. After I paid attention to the details I could easily tell them apart--love those raccoon-striped tails. Sometimes their mom comes along on patrol, too. There are, after all, lessons to be learned.

Cats that patrol our yard live in the barn across the road. The triplets' mom is Penny-Kitty, who I did an earlier blog about.

I knew 'Pork Barrel Spending' would be a hardy daylily even before I got it in the ground. Last September, a few weeks after I had purchased and potted up my two scapes this bad boy was trying, in earnest, to escape its pot. (See photo below) What a unique plant this turned out to be! The large 8" blooms are are well-branched so they look really pleasing when many are open together on one scape.  There are always darker veins and spots visible on each petal, which makes the petals look kind of iris-ish.  The blooms are both consistent and weather-resistant.

Pork Barrel Spending is a Wisconsin daylily hybridized by Nate Bremer and introduced in 2013. It is a dormant tetraploid that grows 31" tall in my yard. It is also categorized as a UFo Cascade, Crispate, and Spatulate. I was very pleased with this daylily's performance; for a first year plant it bloomed from July 3rd to August 5th. By year three it should be nothing short of amazing.

American Green Tree Frogs and daylilies go together like toast and jam. The frogs arrive in late July and early August. Gotta love these little guys; they just sit and patiently wait for their meal to arrive. They often stay on the same plant for days at a time and just move to a new bloom each day. When I deadhead my daylilies it's important that I pay attention and be very careful so that I don't accidentally fling a tiny frog into outer space.

A few of the daylilies pictured include: Sabine Baur, Spanish Glow, She's Got Legs, Techny Peace, and Webster's Pink Wonder.

Okay, I admit it...I bought 'Three Bad Pigs' because I loved the name! Over time Three Bad Pigs has proven to be more than just a catchy name; it is a consistent and prolific plant. The colors are vivid and the beautiful blooms look like my photos all day long. This summer it produced 27 scapes and bloomed like crazy after a merciless winter. Blooms started on July 6, and as of today it still has a few more blooms to go.

Three Bad Pigs was hybridized by Gene Tanner and introduced in 2008. It is a dormant tetraploid that has 5.5" blooms and grows 28" tall in my garden. This is a South Carolina plant that has acclimated perfectly to Wisconsin. As for the name? According to the Browns Ferry Gardens website, Three Bad Pigs got its name after three pigs got loose and had a 'good time' in the hybridizer's daylily beds.

I am completely in love with the daylily 'Music Monkey.' Hybridized in Wisconsin by Phil and Luella Korth of Pinewood Gardens, this showy, dormant tetraploid was introduced in 2007. It is categorized as a UFo (Unusual Form) crispate (floral segments that have a pinched or folded effect). The 7" blooms are waxy and thick. Sun, humidity, rain, or wind don't bother this monkey; he always looks great. Occasionally the sepals twirl and the bloom actually looks like it's dancing! Last year Music Monkey grew 31" tall and bloomed in my garden from July 9 into the second week of August.

Music Monkey was one of my husband's picks, using his 'pretty picture' method of choice. Who knew it would be so awesome? And it surely can't hurt having two award-winning parents like Primal Scream and Unending Melody. If you are a northern gardener, and love oranges like I do, you can't go wrong with Music Monkey. I like the catchy moniker too.

Where do I start? Maybe with died-and-gone-to-daylily-heaven? I spent Saturday with my friend Roger walking one of his seedling fields. This particular field had between 8,000 and 10,000 daylily seedlings. (And yes, you read those numbers correctly.) It was nothing short of amazing! In addition to his magnificent home garden, Roger also keeps two large seedling fields, each in a different location, on extra acreage that friends let him plant on. They, of course, get the added benefit of a beautiful landscape full of flowers.

Roger is an American Hemerocallis Society (AHS) certified daylily garden judge. When he hybridizes, he aims for specific outcomes when making a cross. He keeps in mind parent genetics, bloom color, pattern, size, and substance, branching, bud count, foliage, scape strength, and many other specifics that determine what a good cross may be. Green eyes are one of his favorite bloom traits that he often hybridizes for.

Our main task was to methodically go through the garden and choose the seedlings that we thought showed the most promise. We also tagged some 'put in the compost pile' seedlings. He appreciates other people's opinions, because with 10,000 seedlings it's very easy to overlook a plant or two. And as daylily aficionados, we all like and value something different.

It was a daunting task at first, but for each seedling that caught my eye, I asked myself, 'Does this plant have the wow factor for the characteristics I value?' Everything I loved got tied with pink vinyl tape that had my initials on it. And believe me, there was no shortage of pink tape being used. Here are photos of *just a few* of the seedlings I loved. I stand by all of my choices and I would totally bring any one of these babies home to grow in a heartbeat.

We also did a little bit of pollen-dabbing with some bloom pollen from my garden. It was fun determining which plants to make the crosses with. If only the units on genetics and plant biology were this much fun in school I would have paid more attention.

'Greedy Governor' was part of last year's mission to add more red daylilies to my garden, a color that I didn't have much of. The Gov's first blooms, on June 27, were greeted by extremely high humidity and unrelenting 98-degree temperatures. Being a red (some of which are notorious for melting in the hot sun), the flower substance still looked good in the evening, if only just a bit lighter in color. I thought the lighter look was pleasing, as well. Greedy Governor is categorized as a dormant tetraploid unusual form (UFO) cascade, crispate, spatulate. The blooms are large (8.5") and I love the way the sepals twirl and curl.  In the bright sun the blooms have somewhat of a yellow-orange cast to them and the diamond dusting appears to make them glow. Oh the details! I tried to capture this with my camera but didn't have much luck.

I can see that Gov is already growing taller (29") than expected (26") and this is just year one. No worries;  that can be easily remedied with a future move. From what I have observed so far, I think this will be a hardy, happy plant no matter where I put it.

Greedy Governor was hybridized by Nate Bremer of Solaris Farms in Reedsville, WI and introduced in 2013. I grow a few other Bremer daylilies and they all perform very well in my Zone 4B Wisconsin garden.

As I patiently wait for my daylilies to bloom, I am definitely enjoying my Asiatic lilies in the interim. Here is a hardy and reliable mini I grow named 'Tiny Padhye' (pronounced Pad-high). This cutie was a gift I received from a friend about six years ago. I got the bulbs in early March and placed them in my refrigerator until mid-May when I planted them in the ground. As you can see, they really took off!

This bi-color Asiatic was developed the Netherlands. You can grow it successfully in full sun or part shade (mine are in full sun). It is an easy-care plant that lives in normal, sandy or clay soil that is neutral, alkaline or acid. This variety is also showy in containers, rock gardens, and in front of the border because of its petite size. Tiny Padhye grows approximately 16" to 18" tall. They are said to be deer resistant, but I can't be sure about that since I regularly spray deer deterrent on all of my flowers. The deer in our area seem to eat just about anything and everything. I take no chances.

After a long winter, which continued through the month of April, gardening in Wisconsin proves to be an exercise in delayed gratification. And there's nothing whatsoever I can do -- Mother Nature has the reins. My job is to move the plants around, get rid of the weeds, add mulch, and wait. Looking around the garden, I see lots and lots of scapes, but hardly any flowers yet. Is it really the end of June? The *wait* part is getting harder and harder by the day. So it looks like delayed gratification isn't my only issue; add whining to the list!

Pictured is my old faithful 'Moonlit Masquerade,' one of only four daylilies blooming in my yard on June 24.

I came to the conclusion that I run a round-the-clock resort and spa for rabbits. And it must be five-star, because my yard is infested -- moms, dads, babies, the entire extended family -- they are all here. Accommodations are luxurious: a thicket to hide in, expansive play areas with dirt to roll and dig in, warm rocks to lounge on, water to primp and wash, and a decadent buffet of fresh perennials and weeds that are always available. No room service needed here.

A monumental negative; my resort is not gated. I have seen foxes abduct guests on numerous occasions. Coyotes lurk as well, not to mention the hawks and eagles that soar overhead, looking for a quick meal. And then there's the road... 

Should I post a warning?

Check out this cute miniature hosta. 'Stiletto' can grow up to ten inches in height, although mine typically stays around eight inches tall.  It is perfect for the front of a shade border. Dainty purple striped flowers appear in summer, which I remove after the bloom. Stiletto can be used as a singular plant as seen in my garden photos, or it can also be allowed to spread and used as a showy ground cover. The narrow, ripply leaves with a small creamy-white margin are a nice contrast when used as a companion plant. My plant gets about three hours of early morning sun and it tolerates that amount with no problem.

I've had Stiletto for many years, but I periodically divide it to maintain the pictured size. I recently divided mine in half. Unlike most large established hostas, it divides quite easily, and without the use of a saw :)

Even though the winter of 2017-2018 was devastating to many of my plants, my chick and hens didn't seem to notice. They came through the winter nicely. I bet I've had these chick and hens for over twenty years.  The scientific name for this succulent is "Sempervivum," (from Latin) which means “live forever.” I have occasionally sold them at my plant sale when they are overabundant. I can always depend on them to happily increase back to a huge clump. Some of these chick and hens change color from green to burgundy - bonus! Unfortunately, I don't know the exact variety of Sempervivum mine are because I bought them at a garage sale.

No special care is needed for chick and hens, except to enjoy them -- no fancy soil or fertilizer, although I have read that they prefer a sandy soil. Mine are in part-shade and get the west sun from about 12:30 pm to 6:00 pm. The rock that some of my chicks live in does have drainage on the bottom for when it rains heavily. Chick and hens don't like being waterlogged. Being a succulent, they prefer being on the dry side and are extremely drought tolerant. This is great because if you forget to water them, no worries! I'm confident that just about anyone can grow chick and hens, no matter what their garden skills are.

Whenever I go to garage sales I am always on the lookout for this multi-use tool. Its official name is Vintage Metal/Wood English 3-Tine Hand Garden Fork, but I just refer to it as "the claw." It's one of my favorite garden tools. You can't have too many of them! They go for about $15-$30 on eBay, but mine are the garage sale version for $1 or $2. This claw is awesome! When transplanting daylilies the dirt from the root ball can be removed so easily. It makes what could be a hard job, easy. It's also great for uprooting shallow-rooted weeds.

We painted our two  claws bright red and accessorized them with fluorescent tape so they don't get lost in the garden. Last week one accidentally got thrown into the field along with a bucket of weeds. Uh-oh, instant panic mode!  Luckily, I quickly spotted and retrieved the claw in the pile of weeds thanks to the bright red paint and fluorescent tape. Happy me, because I'd be lost without it!