Chloe

Poor Chloe. It’s not doing too well. Chloe only bloomed for three days this year and reached a height of only 12 inches. Chloe should be 36 inches tall and bloom for about 45 days. At least it did in Indiana.You can see why this used to be one of my favorites. Imagine the pictured bloom on scapes 36 – 40 inches tall, with 10 to 12 blossoms 8 inches across blooming for a month and a half.Sadly, I think I’m going to have to replace Chloe.

© 2007 – 2008, J. M. Erickson. All rights reserved.

Oh goody. My new daylilies came the day before yesterday and I planted them yesterday. I got them from Paradise Garden. The were shipped from one of their suppliers, Oakes Daylilies. Both are located in Corryton, TN. I suspect they are owned by the same folks. The P.O. boxes are only one apart.I am completely satisfied. Each daylily had a minimum of 5 fans. One even had 10 if you count the new growth. They came with plenty of tubers and were in excellent shape. The were shipped within a week of placing my order. My credit card wasn’t charged until the order shipped. They even sent me a bonus daylily.The first (l to r, top to bottom) daylily is Mico. It’s a gold spider variant with 10 inch blooms1 and a height of 44 inches.2The second is White Temptation. This will be my first white daylily ever. It has 5 inch blooms on 32 inch tall scapes. The third is Rosie Meyer. Red is my favorite daylily color. Rosie will join Baja, Red Volunteer, and Sultan’s Warrior, all reds. Rosie has 5 inch blooms on 32 inch tall scapes. They also sent a bonus daylily. I was completely surprised. Chamonix is a rose pink daylily with 6 inch blooms on 30 inch scapes. I’m as happy as a clam.

© 2007 – 2008, J. M. Erickson. All rights reserved.

1. I can hardly wait [↩]
2. This will replace Chloe, a tall lavendar daylily that never got above 10 inches here in Flordia [↩]

Baja

Red Volunteer

Here are two red daylilies. Both I brought with me to Florida from Indiana.The Red Volunteer is doing very well. It was one of the very first daylilies I owned. It’s still one of my favorites. It grows to a height of about 24 inches and blooms for well over a month. It has reached it’s predicted height and is prolific.Baja, on the other hand, while fairly prolific, seems to be stunted in its growth. It should have reached the same height as Red Volunteer, but it’s only 12 inches tall. Also, it should bloom for a couple of months, but last year only made it to 20 days. It was one of my favorite performers in Indiana. Alas, I may have to replace it with something more native to Florida.

© 2007 – 2008, J. M. Erickson. All rights reserved.

Chartwell

This is one of the daylilies that I acquired since moving to Florida. It’s done brilliantly here. Perhaps I’ll replace my non performing varieties with more southernly hospitable varieties.

I now have eight daylilies blooming, making our front yard very colorful.

© 2007 – 2008, J. M. Erickson. All rights reserved.

Monster

This is one of the daylilies I brought from Indiana. It hasn’t performed well here in Florida. This variety is very prolific in Indy, but it barely hangs on in this heat. (By the way, it’s now 7:21 pm and 86° outside. The bloom is the only thing that hasn’t changed from the North to the South. This blossom is roughly 10 inches across, but it sits on a stem that is only 12 inches tall. In Indy these used to be 25 inches tall. They also used to produce three or more fans each year from the primary ones, here I started with two fans three years ago and there are only four now.

I have a couple of other varieties that are doing poorly in this climate. I suspect these varieties, which go dormant in the winter, expect a longer cold spell than the few days we get here in central Flordia.

© 2007 – 2008, J. M. Erickson. All rights reserved.

Dunedin

Here’s another daylily that’s blooming now. This one is a fairly long bloomer…last year it bloomed for 107 days. As with LeeBea Orange Crush, I have two clumps, one more shaded than the other, so I expect to increase the bloom period this year.This is one of the varieties I brought from Indianapolis when we moved in February 2004. At the time I didn’t realize that this variety was named after a town on Florida’s west coast just north of Clearwater. It certainly is thriving unlike some of the varieties I hauled down here with me.

© 2007 – 2008, J. M. Erickson. All rights reserved.

LeeBea Orange Crush

I’ve got four daylily varieties blooming now. Here’s one of my favorites. It’s a cute little thing, only about 14 inches tall, but is very prolific in it’s midpoint of blooming. It only bloomed for about a month last year. I’m hoping for much longer this year. I have two groupings of them, only one of which is blooming now. The other has more shade, so that should delay it and extend the season. Here’s hoping.

© 2007 – 2008, J. M. Erickson. All rights reserved.

Olive Bailey Langdon

Here’s my first daylilly of the season. She’s Olive Bailey Langdon blooming two weeks earlier than last year. It was the first last year too, on April the 14th, but this year bloomed on the 3rd. Oh joy!

© 2007 – 2008, J. M. Erickson. All rights reserved.