THE HUMBLE DAYLILY BECOMES A MOVIE STAR

What many refer to even today as the ditch lily has become one of the most interesting, most diverse, and most beautiful of all perennial garden plants.

From a time when the flowers were used as a food in the orient. China, Japan, Indonesia were consuming great quantities of the flower of the hemerocallis (daylily). When many Chinese, Japanese and Indonesian people migrated to North America they had ship loads of dried daylily blooms shipped here to become their staple food.

Even with this vast number of people eating the blooms of daylily and migrating to America, this flower has not become a staple food here. Eventually the shiploads ceased to arrive as the demand decreased and the immigrants became converted to the local food supplies.

Let us not say that the daylily died in any way. He/she has become a movie star in North America and every year new exotic cultivars appear wearing their fantastic clothing.I say He/she because the daylily is both male and female in parts. In other words, it can produce babies (seeds) or it can be the daddy and supply the male (pollen) for it’s own or other ladies families. Oh to be so diverse and no one complains about it. On the other hand the hybridizers of today’s daylilies are quite happy they can cross in or out, back or forth, or in a strait line to come up with these new and wonderful movie stars of the Daylily world.

I show you the picture at top first of the species that used to be the norm and then a few of the sixty thousand plus, and growing, named cultivars we have today. The American Hemerocallis (daylily) Society keeps the registry for all new and old varieties of daylily. The top picture is the only 'used to be' species (wild) daylily pictured here.

Daylilies shot to the front because of many persons, but a Mr. Arlow B. Stout from Ohio, raised and educated in Wisconsin (1876-1957) is considered the father of the modern daylily. He studied the daylily from 1911 and worked at the New York Botanical Gardens from that date until he died in 1957. His greatest work, in my estimation, is bringing the various colours out of the pigments of the species blooms to make entirely new looks in the hemerocallis (daylily). Look at the top species lily and the tiny bits of colour showing on each petal and then the deep rich colours of Tupac Amaru. From basic wild yellows with reds and orange pigments showing to all colours of the rainbow today. Well, they haven't quite got a true blue as yet , but close.Today the highest annual award a new daylily can have is "The Stout Silver Medal" , awarded to the winning model of all the daylily movie stars by votes made by daylily judges all across North America. Quite an honour if one of yours should reach this status.

This type of hybridization continues today with educated botanists and gardening enthusiasts alike. What is coming forth now would boggle your mind. In fact, to look at a species from 1911-1940 era, you would say this new ’thing’ is not a daylily. But Yes! It Is!, and daylily has come of age. We have cookie (round) shapes, spider shapes, doubles blooms, Unusual forms, Pinched petals, twisted petals, patterns, petals with teeth, petals with hairs, and on and on come the new and different. To be a spider the length of petal must be 4 times longer than it's greatest width, see the stats on 'Gadsden Lady' picture (4.6-1). Means the length of petals are 4.6 times longer than it's greatest petal width.

Most recent on the daylily scene is a pattern on a pattern on a pattern that is totally awesome to behold and accomplished by a former breeder of pigeons with different patterned wings. Who would have thought this could be done? If you live in Ontario, I invite you to join the Ontario Daylily Society to learn more and enjoy other daylily friends.

For joining information visit http://www.ontariodaylily.on.ca , Informative meetings, good friends, bus trips, CAN-AM CLASSIC Convention in April each year. Will be Apr.24,25,&26th in 2009 at Delta Toronto Airport West Hotel, 5444 Dixie Road, Mississauga, Ontario. One root of a pattern daylily auctioned for $1500.00 in April 2008. So you see, the daylily is a hot item, fun to grow and beautiful to boot. They don't all sell that high, so check our movie stars out. Create your very own daylily and have it registered.

Various persons have been instrumental in bringing the many species of the world together. The most and varied come from China and off shore islands as well as Japan, Korea, and Indonesia. All assembled there are some thirty and up of different species and or variations of species that the modern daylily has evolved from. We have here in North America the orange ‘fulva’ daylily that everyone refers to as the “ditch lily” Many cultivars today have this fulva daylily in their background.

Some of the species have evergreen foliage, while others die down to dormancy and then come forth in spring with new renewed growth. From the crossing (hybridizing) of these two leaf types, we now have what is known as semi-evergreen foliage. Generally speaking the evergreen varieties shine in warmer climates and dormants in colder climate. There are a few which will survive in both climates. You do have daylily enthusiasts striving to obtain the cultivars that do best in their area, and they will only buy one that has proven record of doing so.

I have gardened near all my life and needed an interest in my retirement. This has become the hybridizing of daylilies and vegetable gardening that I just refuse to give up because of the freshness for our own kitchen use. My interests lie in large blooms, tall strong scapes, and vigorous, hardy, large bud count, many branches and etc. One of my early successes has been a 45” tall with a large bloom and 34 bud count. I am quite pleased so far. Vigorous growth is a must. As my friend in daylilies says, “If it doesn’t have a plant under it, it sure will not have much to show above it”. The unusual form daylily in picture is 'Primal Scream' and somewhat like a spider flower, is too wide in the petal to qualify to 4-1 length to width of a spider daylily and so is classified as 'Unusual Form'.

If I have spurred an interest in my chosen flower, I suggest you join your local area daylily society and also the ’American Hemerocallis Society’ who are the keepers of the Registry for all new and old Registrations of the hemerocallis (daylily). To find your area region number search http://www.daylilies.org which is the AHS website. Persons in Ontario, New York State and east are in region 4. This takes in Mass. New Hampshire, Maine Nova Scotia, Quebec, Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick, Newfoundland, and Connecticut.