Today, I got a package with daylily roots from one of my favorite places –Shady Rest Gardens.  Well, Doris always sends huge fans . . . and she included some extra fans of two that I ordered.  Two of the ones I ordered were to thicken up some of mine that shrunk in the Southwestern garden.  So, it becomes too much daylily for the pots.  I divided both the new ones into two and put the existing small ones with the smaller division of the new ones.

Pink and Cream

So, now I need to make room in the front or side yard for the extras.  I am giving away a couple that I have doubles of to make room.  And, so it begins . . . which to keep and which to give away?  Is variety better than focusing on favorites?  I have a feeling this problem could get worse before it gets better.  In a way, though, it is nice because you can see how the same cultivator behaves in different conditions in your yard.

Yellow Punch

So, I decided to come up with some stages of daylily obsession:

1.  You consider daylilies the perfect perennial enough that you favor them when you pick out nursery plants for your garden.
2. You start noticing more little things about the daylilies you pick . . . like size, shape, and name.
3. You decide to have daylilies as the dominant plant in at least one garden.
4. You discover that roots are a cheaper way to fill the space, with more selection.
5. You discover the auctions and find several reputable daylily root nurseries.
6. You start to favor some type of bloom or hybridizer.  In my case, it was the Southwestern names of the Ned Robert’s cultivators that caught my eye.
7. You realize there are billions and billions of the type you want . . . you start collecting. You have to make fairly major garden revisions to host so many.
8. A year or two later, you have all the ones you want.  They need to be divided and find new homes. It seems weird to have too many.
9. (I am not here yet) You become a hybridizer and/or farm them to sell.

Coral Taco

Oh, it is my mom’s 100th birthday today.  I wish she could be here to see the Easter Lily Cactus blooms today.  Like daylilies, they only last one day.  I love all their biological features.

Easter Lily Cactus