Hello Yellow is one of my seedlings. It has an extended bloom habit, so it began to open late yesterday afternoon. More info on Hello Yellow tomorrow.
Wishing you a wonderful day!
Daylily Bloom Season Begins
Category: Daylily seedlings
“Making Me Think” Monday – Hit My Threshold
Well … I now have all of the daylily seedlings out of the seedling boxes, and most of the daylily seedlings planted. There are some seedlings that are still kind of small, so they are still in pots, under cloches, and awaiting a future planting day. But most of the seedlings are in the ground now. I cannot tell you how glad I am. And how much I got really tired of planting. I learned my threshold. One or two seedling boxes full were fun, even cute. 4 boxes taking up a corner of my relaxation place – reminding me of all the work I still needed to do – no. Just no. Too much.
And simultaneously, my most stubborn seeds this year, the ones that didn’t germinate in pots, the ones I tossed into open spots in the garden – seeds and soil and loosely put rocks over the top, not even covering them with cloches – are germinating. Even, it seems, one I would have given very minor odds – a cross with Hello Yellow. That got my attention big time, because Hello Yellow seed has been hard to make, and has never germinated.
So, everything smooshed all together. I started seeing direct sow seedlings popping up, I saw my Hello Yellow seed germinate, I was wrist deep in mucky mud, seedlings flopping over in holes, and I was running out of my 20 cloches to cover up my newly planted batches of new varieties of seedlings.
I seriously, seriously love to garden. I seriously, seriously love daylilies. I seriously, seriously love propagating dayliles, And I am seriously, seriously, seriously thinking about downsizing the whole practice of germinating daylily seedlings in pots. It might be time. 2027 might be the perfect time.
- The townhome gardens are full, full, full now. Like really, really full. So full that I am removing the Autumn Reds in back this fall to make room for new crosses that succeed next spring.
- I am doing very few new crosses this year – only four new ones, and two of those are a reverse of a success, just for giggles.
- I am doing one replication, in case I ever want to register it, and
- I am retrying four failures, just in case they would finally work.
- Any other daylily seed harvest will be self-seed.
My previous fails at direct sow germination of daylily seeds did not include stratification or planting them with good soil. This year’s successes included those practices. By accident, admittedly, but worth considering. And the new and replication crosses would hit my enjoyment threshold for germinating in pots (5). Anything after that could be direct sow.
So, I am thinking, seriously thinking. Life in daylily planting-ville was a lot this year. My threshold is now very known. Using wisdom 😉
And what of the extra planters? Well, someone I know and love is trying his hand at growing hot peppers again, and enjoying it, so far. He really likes to cook, and he likes hot sauces. We have some canning jars from when I thought they were adorable and could be made into little candle holders lol (never did). Homemade hot sauce? It could be a project. For him. I don’t eat that stuff. No siree. And maybe just one planter full of peppers to start 😉
Fantastic Find Friday
The forecast today was for rain on and off throughout the day, so I planned a stay-at-home day. On days like that I can get some planting and weeding done and if it starts to rain, I can take a break in the house.
As I was scoping out optional planting space, I was thinking about planting over a space where I had put daylily seeds that hadn’t germinated in seedling pots. Well, above is what I found. A very nice surprise!
Later, hands full of slushy mud, moving rock carefully back in place so I didn’t crush the baby daylily seedlings, I thought to myself that perhaps the way to go is direct seed after all. It hasn’t been successful here in the past, but maybe I should consider it again for next year.
Grand Experiment Now Done, Done, Done
It is raining tonight! Perfect timing!
Today the seedling box with my grand experiment got emptied out. The one where I planted one seed per tiny pot in 6 pk trays. Little squirrel did try to start the emptying job ahead of me, but those efforts were unsuccessful, thank goodness.
Out of the 48 daylily seeds I planted in those little pots, one did germinate and went to seedling. I thought it might be the cross, but a few days ago the other seeds of that same cross that I planted my normal way – multiple seeds per larger pot – started to germinate. They were planted a month later and went outside later as well. So, the little 6 pk seedling trays are definitely out, and I chalk it up to experience and move on.
Under the cloche (wire protective basket) in the picture below are the contents of the grand experiment – the one daylily seedling and then a couple of what I think are the Malva Zebrina Hollyhocks I have mentioned in previous posts. Maybe the “gift” of those teeny tiny pots is the germination of those 20+ year old hollyhock seeds? Kind of. I do have another of those hollyhock seedlings in a larger pot too, planted at the same time.
Anyway … My heart is so happy to see that daylily seedling in the ground with the two hollyhocks. They look teeny tiny right now, but I know only too well their potential. My guess is that next year that big pot full of shamrocks will not have a home in that location 😉
Full Days – Pics with a Tiny Bit of Narration
And the icing on the cake – the purple irises are starting to bloom at the historic cemetery.
Beyond that, the daylily seedlings are popping up at a pretty good pace now with the warmer weather. We have our first seedlings from crosses with South Seas self-seed daylilies, and we have new crosses from our regular stock, including two new crosses with Red Volunteer.
Wishing you a wonderful day ahead!
A Very Satisfying Accomplishment, Time Now to Enjoy
Today I finished planting the 2025 harvested daylily seeds. It was so incredibly satisfying to refresh my pivot table after entering today’s accomplishments and see … no lines left. Hooray!!! It was an experience. A shall not be repeated experience. Way, way, way too much “fun”. But everything is accounted for and reconciled. Now we wait to see what nature does.
First fun story – After planting all the daylily seeds, I realized I have four labels/tags left. They were from a very welcome discovery today. I thought I was out of labels. And I was not going to buy anything more for the 2025 harvested seeds. I was cutting up the flat side of the plastic trays from the 4 pks of cream cheese danish, cutting strips, and using that for labels! So today, after finding the forgotten stack of labels, and using them, there were four left. A confirmation to stick with the “only four” crosses I have planned this year? I think so 😉
Second fun story – About 1/2 hour after I finished planting the rest of the daylily seeds and had put away all the supplies, we were sitting outside relaxing. In hummed … the first hummingbird to visit this year! It looked big and healthy. It hummed in, looked around, and hummed back out. It is May! The hummingbirds are back! You can bet the first of the feeders has food cooling down right now and will go out shortly.
And for beauty – The gardens look awesome. They are filling out so nicely. It should be a few more weeks and the Asian lilies will start to bud out. And the clematis out back are starting to vine so they should have blooms to share in a few weeks.
Time now for patio time – for long morning coffees, or a beverage of choice in the afternoon. Just sitting, chatting with neighbors, and relaxing as much as a gardener can. We can. With some occasional “let me check one thing” moments 😉
I leave you with another picture of one of the white squirrels, from this morning.
Wishing you a wonderful weekend!
Can’t Win ‘Em All
These trays were planted indoors on March 23rd and went outdoors on April 12th. On April 24 I saw the one seedling (in the shadow of the cross bar) and since then nothing else has come up.
Here’s reasons I can think of for the failure:
- The seeds need more time out in warmer weather. (Maybe. I will give them a couple more weeks.)
- The trays are horrible (I’m going with this one. These trays are not staying. Way too putzy for me, and so far, the results stink.)
- The one seed that did germinate was the only viable seed. (They all looked good when I planted them.)
Here’s some positives:
- Even though these may be a 98% bust, there is one seedling, so far. It only takes one.
- This batch was a test of a reverse cross of a wildly successful cross from last year. The pod parent is one of my favorite daylilies, Pink Tirzah, but the data available is a bit scant. Most of what I know about Pink Tirzah is what I have proven out myself, including even ploidy. Now I am working on fertility. The pollen from Pink Tirzah has been awesome, but as a pod parent, not so much. I have only had one other cross that went to seedling with Pink Tirzah as the pod parent. I am hoping for bloom on that one this year. I do love Pink Tirzah, so the work continues. This year, besides seeing how this cross goes, I am hoping to get Pink Tirzah self-seed, as I will not be doing intentional crosses with Pink Tirzah this year.
- And there is still hope. I have a medium pot of seeds of this same (reverse) cross I planted and put out a few days ago, using my usual very successful, albeit quite lazy, method 😉
We shall see how things proceed.
Wishing you a wonderful weekend!
Just one – tulip
I have planted lots of tulips over the years. They bloom a variety of successive years and then fizzle out. This year only one bloomed. That is down from two last year.
Part of me says I could dig out the old greens to tidy up. Currently unproductive tulip bulbs only get removed when I want the space, and nowadays that is exclusively for daylily seedlings. Unfortunately, I have tried daylily seedlings in this area, and they get stepped on:( But, wheels turning … Maybe a certain Pink Tirza and Autumn Red cross will bloom this year and be the first seedlings turned daylilies to move to this area. To join their parents? It’s a thought.
In the meantime, we will enjoy our one tulip bloom 🙂
Wishing you a wonderful weekend!
What a difference a week makes!
We are at the end of April now, and what a difference the last week has made!
Sandy’s Corner is really filling out.
- The daylilies look great.
- Last year’s seedlings are much farther along than in previous years when I was still working at finding out what they liked best.
- The hostas are even looking much fuller this year.
- And our volunteer shrub does indeed look like a currant. It can stay, at least for now. The birds will probably love it.
On the flip side, I could kick myself for buying those tiny little 6 cell seed planting setups. They definitely fit perfectly into the grey seedling boxes, but the seeds are not germinating like they do when I plant medium pots of up to 20 “same” seeds together. I think I know someone who might appreciate them for starting veggie seeds next year 😉
Overall, I am finding that I really like what I have going on in the townhome gardens this year. It has been fun to see the new look and focus come up, and I am more convinced than ever that scaling way back on the crosses this year is the right plan. I can always scope up if I want to, but I am definitely not enjoying that I have so much work yet to go on getting last year’s seeds going. A lighter scope next year continues to sound fabulous.
The historic cemetery gardens are really filling out as well.
This past weekend my husband and I went over and did some spring cleanup at the historic cemetery gardens. They are really looking good! I do suspect our phantom weeders have been helping as well, because I kind of remember it being a little messier a week or so ago. So, thanks to them!
There is one sad thing. Over the past couple years, I have added purchased bare root daylilies to the historic cemetery gardens, as well as added seedlings from crosses I did at the townhome gardens. When I walked though a week or so ago, it looked like they were not there. This past weekend that was confirmed. There are moles or gophers over there, but the markers are almost all missing too, so that is odd. At any rate, I do have the seeds I harvested from there last fall, and I will direct sow those to do one final try with seeds and seedlings, but I think I have my answer. Bare root planting is a no go there. And probably seed and seedling planting as well.
On the upside, the daylily from South Seas self-seed that I planted at the historic cemetery last fall is thriving, so additions like that may be an option, go forward.
That’s the gardens updates for the week.
I hope you have a great week ahead!
White Squirrel – and we still need protection for the seedlings
Oh yes, the white squirrels are super fun. And they, like their grey buddies, would love to dig in whatever it is that I have in the seedling boxes.
And we have our first Autumn Red cross seedling up. And screen will be going on the seedling box shortly 🙂
I hope you have a wonderful day!
Be Blessed!
Susan's Daily Garden 