Early yesterday heavy thunderstorms rolled through leaving about 1.2" in the rain guage. Most of the blooms were beaten up pretty well so I didn't bother to try and get any pictures. Too bad as there were a handful of really super blooms that would have made great pictures without the rain damage. Still, I'm not complaining as the daylilies (and the lawn) were most appreciative of the natural watering.

Seedling 12-070

Seedling 12-070 has 6" blooms on 24" scapes and comes from the cross (Winter Wayfarer X Priscilla's Smile).

One of my projects for this coming fall will be to eliminate a number of seedlings that just aren't worth the time and effort to grow. I have several (too many) where the bloom is nice enough that if they only had a higher bud count I would be happy with them. Many of these will be culled from the garden in the fall. The overall objective is to give me room to space out the clumps. My daylilies have always been grown way too close together to maximize the number of cultivars for hybridizing and now it's time to give the keepers the growing space they deserve.

The process of selecting those to be removed has already begun because pictures and stats aren't the only criteria to be considered. For example, seedling 15-006 (a couple of posts back) has a relatively low bud count but it makes up for it by producing a lot of scapes and daily blooms which results in a nice show in the garden. If this seedling only had a few blooms each day it might be on the chopping block. On the other hand, a seedling the same low bud count but an especially nice bloom might be still be kept even if it doesn't produce a lot of blooms each day.

Seedling 15-009

Seedling 15-009 has 6" blooms on 24" scapes. It comes from the cross (Mississippi Memento X Thomas Tew).

Every night right after dinner I deadhead the entire garden. It's a bit of a pain (so says my back) but the garden looks so much better in the morning without all the previous day's wilted blooms. I'm amused at the reactions I see of the people walking by while I'm doing this. Most of the blooms still look good and some of the people's faces indicate they're wondering why I'm 'cutting off all the flowers'. The majority of people in this neighborhood appear to be non-gardening types and probably don't even know what kind of 'flowers' I grow. There are exceptions of course but over the years I've had more questions about why I have signs by each flower as opposed to what kind of flowers I grow.

Seedling 16-052

Todays image is seedling 16-052. I'm embarrased to admit that I almost tossed this one last fall as it had never opened very well. Fortunately, it made the cut and rewarded my patience with this bloom. It has 6" blooms on 24" scapes and comes from the cross (Celtic Moonglow X Rose Sensation).

Yesterday's forecasted rains bypassed us to the north so today I'm watering. Daylilies handle dry conditions fairly well but the best blooms always come 2-3 days after a good rain. So to enjoy bloom season to the fullest, I water the garden every 3-4 days or so if mother nature doesn't cooperate.

Seedling 15-006

Seedling 15-006 had 8 blooms open today (there's a bloom hidden behind the others). It has 6" blooms on 27" scapes and comes from the cross (Mississippi Memento X Thomas Tew).

As expected, the rain a couple days ago followed by warm sunny days has resulted in an explosion of bloom in the garden. This is truely an unusual year as 2/3 of my seedlings have already started blooming and there's still more than a week left in April.

Seedling 14-003

Seedling 14-003 has been blooming for 3 weeks and it's still putting on a show. The 4.5" salmon colored blooms open consistently on well branched 28" scapes. It comes from the cross (Mississippi Memento X Wild Cherry Round Up).

A heavy thunderstorm kept me from walking the garden this morning. I'm not complaining because we really needed the rain. Temperatures are also warming and with today's rain, blooms should be better in a couple of days.

You may have heard the phrase "both bad news and good news" regarding some situations (I personally I prefer to put the bad news first because I like the conversation to end on the good news). My Covid virus "bad news" is that our daylily club meetings as well as our annual daylily show have been canceled. While it's disappointing, it's a small price to pay for increasing the safety for our fellow daylily friends. The good news is that the daylily bloom season started early this year which helps occupy our time while we're staying at home.

Seedling 12-066

Today's image is seedling 12-066. It has 6" blooms on 25" scapes and comes from the cross (Catching The Light X Lacy Border).

I finally was able to spray again for rust this morning. It was a little breezy but it looked like today would be the best weather for about a week so I put on my respirator and went for it. Today's fungicide of choice was Cleary's 336F, part of my regular rotation.

Several days of early morning temps in the 40's have slowed down bloom and the blooms I have had are smaller than normal. That means the camera hasn't had much work.

Seedling 16-024

Seedling 16-024 bloomed right before the cool weather arrived. It has 6" blooms on 24" scapes and comes from the cross (May I Have This Dance X Sarah Starchak). When the weather get hot the bloom is often quite recurved which tends to conceal the nice ruffled edges.

The following is a theory based on my observations and should be treated as such.

When I first started in daylilies I heard that an unusually cool spring frequently resulted in shorter than normal scapes with lower than usual bud counts for many cultivars. I can even remember one particular year that had a very cool spring where the daylily show judges took the weather related lower bud counts into account when point scoring entries.

This winter the temperatures were fairly normal but in early spring temperatures quickly became unusually warm. In fact, it's been reported by the local weather folks that this was the warmest March on record in the Houston area.

As part of the evaluation process I've been tracking scape heights and bud counts on many of my seedlings and the results this year surprised me. I assumed that the very warm early temperatures would have increased scape heights and bud counts but it turns out that in many cases, the opposite was true. I have lots of shorter scapes and lower bud counts than previous years. I suspect that the reason for this might be that the unusually early heat wave pushed the daylilies to bloom early thereby reducing the amount of time the daylilies spent on scape growth and bud production. Taking this theory back to the cool spring results, I suspect there's a similar cause. Early scape and bud production was slowed by unusually cool temperatures and then it warmed up quickly rushing the daylilies into bloom, again at the expense of scape and bud production. Note that some daylilies had normal scape heights and bud counts even with the unusual spring weather so it appears that genetics may also play a part.

Seedling 16-013

Seedling 16-013 has 5.5" blooms on 26" scapes. It comes from the cross (Blue Eyed Angel X Celestial Shore).

A few years back, I made the decision not to make any new crosses as the overall process of hybridizing was becoming more than my old bones could keep up with. Since then, I have continued to grow and evaluate my existing seedlings and still have a number of possible future registrations. I must confess however, that I find myself getting nostalgic as I walk the garden enjoying the new season blooms. I miss the excitement of planning new crosses.

Seedling 16-136

Today's image is seedling 16-136. It has 6" blooms on 24" scapes and comes from the cross (Calamity Jane X (Wild Cherry Round Up x Walter Kennedy)).

I had been doing so well keeping up with rust this year but that ended recently. The weather has been cooperating with rust more than with me lately and coordinating the good days with my own schedule just hasn't worked out. All is not lost, but my photos will certainly include more rusty foliage than I'd like.

Seedling 14-026

Seedling 14-026 is one of my favorite seedlings. It has huge foliage in the spring and I love the full round ruffled form. Perhaps the best attribute is the heavy bloom substance. It stands up to rain quite well. It has 6" blooms on 30" scapes and comes from the cross (May I Have This Dance X Hog Heaven).

Yesterday afternoon's weather was warm and more humid than a sauna... in other words, perfect for daylily bloom production. Warmth and humidity make the outside of the bloom buds nice and supple which helps them open properly. As such, today's blooms were the best so far this season. If we have a few mornings in the 40's or low 50's some cultivars may take a few days before they start looking good again. It seems the outside of the larger buds (sepals) can become less flexible from the cold causing these blooms not to open as well.

Flamingo Wings (Jarvis, 2014)

I registered Flamingo Wings as a mid-season bloomer. Since then, it has been blooming more early-season and this year it's early again. It has 7.5" blooms on 40" scapes although the scapes are somewhat shorter this year probably because I divided it last fall.

It's been quite cool and rainy for the past couple of days but the daylilies continue to bloom. No pictures though...

Hybridizing isn't all rainbows and unicorns and fantastic successes. Even when something has a pretty bloom, it doesn't always mean that you have a winner. In fact, the majority of hopefuls usually never make the grade as they have one or more serious flaws. Therefore a hybridizer has to be ready to toss out many seedlings with pretty blooms. It's hard to do especially at first but eventually the realization sinks in that if you want to plant more seeds, some of the existing seedlings have to go to make room.

Seedling 15-088

Seedling 15-088 is a prime example of a seedling with a nice bloom that has only one redeeming quality (IMHO) and that's the color. It always blooms with this bright red color which really stands out in the garden. Unfortunately, the rest of the plant's attributes are very poor. So poor in fact, that I wouldn't even consider giving it away. Short scapes, few buds, and weak plants don't belong in anyone's garden.

My project for today was to replace some of the garden markers that had finished their useful life. Garden markers (for daylily names or seedling numbers) have always been important to me. Yes, I have maps for each bed and I even have a location set up in my daylily database that tracks where each daylily is located. But there are reasons to be able to recall what a specific daylily is when I'm out in the garden. Probably the most useful of these reasons is for when I take pictures. Each time I take a picture of a daylily, I follow it with a picture of the sign. Then when I'm renaming the day's photos there won't be any questions.

When I first started growing daylilies I realized the importance of having markers (at least for me) however I couldn't afford most of the markers available at that time. I was fortunate to locate a company that made markers I could afford (my first purchase back in the late 80's cost only 25 cents each). They weren't as pretty as the others but they were galvanized and came with rectangular aluminum inserts that could be changed out. This meant that I could re-use the markers. That was important because of the number of daylilies and seedlings that turn every year in a hybridizer's garden.

The downside to using these was that while they lasted, they didn't last forever. Over time, the stake would rust and eventually pieces would break off. This means they got shorter as time went on. I'm not complaining, mind you... they lasted many years so I really got my money's worth! So today, I replaced a bunch of markers that had stakes so short the name plates were at ground level. FYI - the company closed 5 or 6 years ago so these markers are no longer available.

Seedling 16-007

This image, taken today, is seedling 16-007. It has 5.5" blooms on 30" scapes and comes from the cross (Priscilla's Smile X Emerald Bay).

It's being reported that this March has been the warmest March on record. This is probably why we're having the earliest start to bloom season in memory. Blooms in March are fairly rare here however this year I've already had bloom on 19 different daylilies so far.

Seedling 15-019

This is seedling 15-019 from a few days ago. It has 6" blooms on 30" scapes and comes from the cross (Bella Vita X Frank's Red Hot Tamale). It has robust foliage with leaves up to 33" in length.

A cool front blew through last night so the unusually warm and humid weather is gone for the time being. Daylilies really seem to like warm temperatures and humidity especially if it doesn't cool off too much at night. There are a couple of seedlings with FBO's this morning, both with lots of buds for future blooms. Seedling 15-002 (previous post) has 5 blooms open today and that's after having 8 open yesterday.

No rain to speak of for about a week now so I dragged out the hoses and I'm watering my beds as I write this. Daylilies are at their best with plenty of water.

Seedling 15-028

Today's image is seedling 15-028. Today's bloom was much nicer than yesterday's. It has 5" blooms on 22" scapes and comes from the cross (Mississippi Memento X Parrot Jungle).

This is one of the earliest daylily blooms I can remember. It's still March and there are scapes everywhere and seven cultivars have already bloomed. It continues to be quite warm setting record high temperatures a couple of days this week. It looks like in a couple of days we might be back down to normal temps for this time of year.

I tend to not get much 'productive' work done in the garden once bloom season really gets underway. I'd much rather spend time enjoying the fruits of my labors (or should I say flowers of my labors - smile). There are pictures to take and notes to be made to help in evaluating for keepers in the fall but I certainly don't consider that work.

Hedwig's Eyes

Hedwig's Eyes (Jarvis, 2005) is one of my early bloomers and had FBO a couple days ago. This image was taken today before the drizzle started. It has 5.5" blooms on 32" scapes and comes from the cross (Isle of Zanzibar × Awesome Blossom).

We've received 1.5" of rain during the past couple of days. This is most welcome as daylilies thrive and blooms are best when there's lots of rain. The downside to lots of rain is that water on blooms detracts from getting good pictures (IMHO).

Seedling 15-002

I finally got a decent picture of this year's first seedling to bloom. 15-002 has 5.5" blooms on 27" scapes and comes from the cross (Mississippi Memento X Calamity Jane). Temperatures were in the upper 50's so the bloom opened relatively flat instead of more recurved which is more typical during warmer temperatures. This is one of four blooms open this morning.