Freakin' At the Freaker's Ball

This is a picture of Stella de Oro daylily. A sloppy photo at best, but, I wanted to show (clockwise starting at the top): blooming flower, a bud not opened, a spent flower and a seed pod.

I've often been asked, "Is the only reason to deadhead daylilies to make the plant look better?" The answer to that is, "Yes, it does make the plant look better." And, "No, there is a more important reason for deadheading."

If a daylily is allowed to set seed heads, the plant will put energy into developing those seeds and preform as if it's the end of the blooming season. At the end of the season, a plant will not concentrate on blooming. For an continuous bloomer like Stella, that will limit the new flowers and the length of the bloom season.

Even the non-continuous bloomers will put more energy into making fully developed flowers over an extended bloom period if they are deadheaded daily.

For the meticulous: carry a sack and slip the spent flowers inside. For the rest of us: simply toss on the ground and know they will go to mush in a few days.

Another reason for deadheading every morning: Photographs will never have a glob of dead flower to spoil the look.

____Freakin' at the Freaker's Ball____

I have no idea where I got that phrase but I immediately thought of my crazy daylily madness. Must be my latent heavy metal past catching up with me in the garden.

_____Peak Daylily Shows_____

Our early spring and heavy rains have contributed to an early bloom season - daylies and others. Commercial nurseries are no exception. Hornbaker Gardens' newsletter says their daylily fields will be at peak starting around June 25 and some varieties will start the end of July.

Here's a break for those who live around professional daylily gardens: It is much better to see the daylilies growing up close and personal than in a catalog. Seeing a group of daylily freakers in a daylily field is surely a daylily freaker's ball.

And if you see multitudes of daylily freaks freakin' at the freaker's ball, try to ignore us - we're harmless and you just might become one...