Loving the Blooms!

Good Evening Daylily Friends,

This morning I went directly to the Greenhouse, and once I arrived that is where I stayed until around 1:30 p.m., this afternoon. I adored the blooms. One of the first that I saw was one that I introduced several years ago which is PASTOR LAURIE ANN MOELLER. This year it is a candidate for the AHS Award of "Honorable Mention." It was initially registered to be a semi-evergreen, but over the years I have found that indeed it is a dormant. Every bloom looks good; it seldom, if ever, has a bad bloom. I'm showing a picture of PASTOR MOELLER. I must also admit that while in the Greenhouse I forgot to turn on my phone and I missed several important phone calls.

The second flower that I noticed was my own Seedling 8-244. What an astonishing daylily. It is 35 inches in height with 5-way branching. It is an evergreen and it never stops growing. The scape is as big as that of a small tree. Even though it is an evergreen I have found that it is a very good parent. Judging by the color of 8-244 you would think that it always throws red colors, but alas, it also throws dark colors as well. Indeed, I am showing Seedling 1-317 which is red in its eye and edge, and I am showing Seedling 1-312 which is very dark in color. You wouldn't think that both 1-317 and 1-312 would both have 8-244 as a pollen parent. I am going to try to post all three pictures here together.

I have also had another success from using my TET. HEAVEN ALL DAY. I converted this Carpenter daylily several years ago, and I've tried a number of times to use it as a parent, but I've always produced flower that were too short. This past spring I used TET. HEAVEN ALL DAY as a pollen parent for Stamile's LACY ALL OVER. Voila! There it is. A gorgeous new white. I stand at look at it, and admire its beauty and its height of 32 inches. I also am pleased that it has branching, and two proliferations. Actually, I have had several seedlings from this cross that were just as nice as Seedling 1-311, but the other flowers had "issues." I will continue to grow them, and try to correct some of these issues. I remember looking at HEAVEN ALL DAY and as diploid, and I just admired its nearly pure white color. I have that same sense looking at Seedling 1-311.

Tomorrow I must be up early to get to the Greenhouse, and then I am off to speak to a club in a nearby city. Amid all of this I must ship plants, and get ready for a Newspaper reporter who is coming to the garden on Wednesday morning.

Bill