Today was Weeding Wednesday. It also ended up being shrub trimming day.
After two days of very warm weather, and very little garden activity, I was tired of just looking out the windows. I wanted to get more than just occasional fresh air. I wanted to get things done. This morning the weather was a tiny bit cooler. I rationalized 1) I had nothing on my schedule that was to be done away from home, so 2) Even though it was going to be warm and humid, I could just poke around – work outside a bit and then cool down inside, and do that as many times as I wanted today. Outside I went. It was time to pull forget-me-nots and trim the bushes.
I love the end of those types of days, where I can just putz, still see a nice difference. It was a warm day, uncomfortable to work for very long, but the gardens look they are spruced up and ready for the daylilies to start blooming.
Last night I also noticed Hello Yellow was starting to bloom again.
Early this morning it was already open.
And it stayed open all day.
It is so fun to have that extended bloom daylily.
I checked it a little before 10pm and it was still open 🙂 The fireflies had been out for quite some time, and Hello Yellow was still blooming. Such a treat!
And one of the two remaining daylilies I was watching for scapes (Tender Love) is starting to get at least one scape. (I am guessing there will be more starting soon.) Tender Love is a key daylily in my planned crosses this year, so I was very happy to see that. (Regrettably, Marque Moon is still holding out on scapes, so the crosses I had planned with it are probably not going to happen this year.)
There is also a daylily (Hush Little Baby) that I planted in fall of 2024 that had greens last year but no scapes. This year it looked like it was going to be a repeat, but later this evening I looked over and did a double take. A scape! I am looking forward to that addition!
On the hosta front, the Blue Mouse Ears are looking great.
I definitely have plans to divide and transplant the remaining couple clumps this fall that are in their old location. With the addition of daylily seedlings along the path, they are overdue for a better spot.
Which leads me to something I have been noticing quite a bit.
When I started building out our gardens here, I had an idea that it would be fun to have them look nice from both outside and from inside. I have really enjoyed that for over two decades. But lately I realized one particular garden is looking especially nice from the inside – Sandy’s Corner. Over the past five years or so I have been reversing the locations of the daylilies and hostas in that garden, way before I named it Sandy’s Corners. It is getting quite full now with daylilies at various stages, and now when I look outside from inside, the daylilies are the backdrop, and the hostas are increasingly back to my earliest configuration, closest to the house. I like it! Not only does it make more sense for sun exposure, but it showcases the hostas that were gradually getting hidden. It has taken time to carefully do the divisions and transplants, but I think that this fall we will be there.
And with that, I will wrap up with one final reality – gardening is very iterative. The littlest things make a difference, it doesn’t have to be fast, and even favorites might not last forever. This week, as we were sitting out on the patio, my husband tested the waters on a subject that could have gone south. Could have. But I had been thinking about the same thing. My approach to replacing some of my oldest, favorite daylilies that are fading. Am I OK with replacing them with new ones I have hybridized from those older daylilies. A couple years ago I tried to add another Marque Moon, and it failed. South Seas is starting to fail. I will be dividing it this fall and transplanting, but if it doesn’t do well I am questioning if I will be OK with not having a South Seas daylily is the garden. Do I work with what is already doing well and let those old favorites go? I am reminded that I didn’t replace all those hostas we lost a couple years ago …
Just something to think about. Gardens are definitely iterative.
Susan's Daily Garden 