Choices, Choices

Today I've started looking through the Solaris online catalog for candidates for my daylily patch.  Solaris has a good selection.  Their more recent introductions are fairly expensive, but much of their stock is reasonably priced.  The bed behind the house will incorporate other plant materials, but daylilies have long been a special favorite, in part because I seem unable to kill them!  They are very tolerant of soil conditions and drought, and generally want little more than to be dug, divided, and replanted every five years or so.

East My Dust

Fallen Leaves

Jane Lough

Saigon Summer

In Detroit I had about 30 plants, but had to leave them behind when I moved first to Grand Haven, and then to Presque Isle.  The only one I preserved, by giving a division to Susan and John, is the daylily I called "Outrageous Orange" — because I mislaid the actual name of the cultivar.  It has tall scapes (branches) and large, intense red-orange flowers.  Hopefully John will let me have a division to plant up here.

Filling the bed will take several seasons, but perhaps in 2012 I can plant a dozen or so and get a good start on a collection.  Thousands of daylily cultivars are on the market, so I'll run out of flower bed long before I exhaust the color options.  But hunting down something different and beautiful is part of the fun.  Perhaps along the way I'll rediscover my "Outrageous Orange" under its real name. •••