More Than a Pretty Face: Plant Habit

By Rich Howard

Introduction
Many people new to daylilies are overwhelmed by the number of different daylilies available to purchase. New addicts may run up bills their spouses find shocking by stuffing every nook and cranny of their garden with every pretty face they like .Later disappointment may set in when many of these do not perform to expectations—some may have only a few blooms each year, and others may even die. Is there a good way to go about deciding what plants to buy?

I have family in Voorhees New Jersey that I used to visit several times a year. I would try to time my trips so I could visit Darrell Apps’ Woodside Nursery in Bridgeton for a day in April, when he would start selling potted hems. We became friendly, in part because of the large sums of money I would spend there I suspect (lol), and one day he asked me if I wanted to see his seedling beds. While strolling through the fields he would stop on occasion and comment “Look at that branching”. I was relatively new to daylilies at the time and would stop to look at the prettiest ones. He would patiently point out the lack of branching and bud count in many of these and emphatically state there was no way they would be introduced. “It’s all about the plant habit” he would say.

Plant habit
Plant habit may mean different things to different people. I define it as a measure of a plant’s performance with respect to its physically observed features. It includes foliage habit ( Dormant, Evergreen, Semi-evergreen), bud count, branching, bloom spacing, foliage appearance (including rust resistance), rate of increase and overall vigor, how well a flower opens on cool mornings, as well as the basic traits of height, bloom size, and scape height with respect to foliage height. I am probably forgetting a few items (or perhaps including too many), but you get the picture.

Hardiness
It is rare to find any plant that will grow well across a myriad of growing zones. While many daylilies hybridized in Southern climates will do OK in the North, some will not. Likewise, gardeners in the South have difficulty growing dormant daylilies. It should be noted however, that the designations Evergreen, Semi Evergreen and Dormant to not pertain to a plant’s hardiness, but rather to what happens to the foliage during winter.

Bud count
In daylilies the bud count is of particular importance, since each bloom lasts for only one day. I marvel at the number of bloomed seedlings that people buy on auction sites with no indication of the plants’ bud count. It’s that pretty face syndrome at work. Some varieties with lower bud counts may be good garden subjects if they can rebloom and provide a respectable amount of color for the space they take up. But rebloom can be iffy for those of us in the North, and a plant with high bud count is a good thing for us. When plants are registered with AHS one of the pieces of information that the hybridizer must provide is the bud count. The bud count is also normally shown in catalogs and web sites. Unfortunately, the bud count in one’s garden is not always as high as the one billed.

What’s up with that?
It could be several things. New plants take a while to settle in. There is an old adage that goes something like this: the first year perennials sleep, the second year they creep, and the third they leap. Give your new daylily time to settle in.

As already noted, some plants hybridized in the South may not do well in the North, and vice-versa. I have been told that a plant may lose a branch and 5 buds from its registered values for each growing zone it moves north from its originally hybridized garden.

It could also be that the plant is not happy where it is in your garden for it to live up to its potential. If a daylily is not performing well you might want to try moving it to a sunnier location. Daylilies are very tolerant of less than ideal conditions, but sometimes will do better in a different spot in the yard.

While daylilies are drought tolerant, it also is possible that they are not getting enough moisture. How much water you actually need is in part a function of your soil type and climate. Frequent shallow watering is undesirable as opposed to less frequent deep watering.

Have you ever had your soil tested? The University of Connecticut does it for $8-a true bargain to identify possible nutritional deficiencies and/ or ph imbalance in your soil. For example, daylilies grown too close to the house foundation may underperform because the ph may have become too alkaline from the materials in the concrete leaching into the soil. A simple soil test can identify such problems. When I give talks at garden clubs and I ask, it is rare that any attendees have had a soil test done. Adding garden sulfur can add the necessary acidity to the soil in such situations, or you can move the plants. Daylilies like a ph slightly acidic, in the 6.2-6.8 range.

Bud-builders
Some daylilies are “bud-builders”. What does this mean? The AHS Daylily Dictionary (see http://www.daylilies.org/ahs_dictionary/) says: “Scientifically called "indeterminate inflorescence," it means "continuing to grow at the apex" or end of the scape. A pattern of growth on scapes in which buds continue to form as lower buds open. A scape showing this characteristic will get taller through the bloom season. It is a somewhat unreliable trait, dependent upon weather and growing conditions. Later bloom tends to be sparse.”

If you were to count the number of buds on a variety which is a bud-builder when it first started blooming, you would not get a true picture of its actual bud count. It will have more buds when it is done blooming as determined by the number of bud scars on the scape.

So what do I do?
You always should consider more than just a pretty face when buying a daylily. The best advice that I could give to a newbie as far as what plants to grow is to visit gardens near you and see what grows well there. Attending a Regional meeting is one of the best ways to do this. There also is a list of display gardens readily available on the AHS portal. Join a local club and listen to what others are growing well in your area. And get in the habit of looking for plant habit!