Years ago I rolled my eyes at daylilies and now I don’t know how I ever gardened without them. I like “Zing!” in my flowerbeds. I enjoy rich colors on long-blooming plants. Our growing season is short enough as it is, I don’t want to spend most of it looking at foliage.
In 2005 I had a few dozen daylilies, but I wasn’t in love with them like I am now so they were relegated to places where they couldn’t shine. When I look at the photo of some of my flowerbeds below I see too much foliage and not a lot of color variety.
Flash forward to 2007 (photo below). I planted quite a few daylilies in the midst of my annuals and perennials and, in my opinion, there’s much more pizzazz. Even the surrounding plants have come to life.
The same trait that caused me to dislike daylilies for years is now my favorite reason for growing them—the blooms only last a day. While that might sound like a bad thing, it makes every day in the garden a thrill. Will there be a flush of purples or pinks today, or will the oranges and reds be the star of the show? You never know what you’ll get, and it’s fun to jump out of bed each morning to see all the new blooms. What I really love is that there are endless opportunities for beautiful photographs because the garden looks different every single day.
Now if I could just figure out a way to squeeze 60,000 daylily cultivars into my small city garden…