A Quilt of Daylilies for the Summer Garden

When Storey's rights director, Maribeth Casey, e-mailed me photos and a long caption for our July Bloom Day post, I was intrigued by her description of how many varieties of daylilies she has blooming in her garden and asked if she'd take more photos so I could share them on a longer post. Here are eight more of her beautiful blooms and her caption.

- Melanie Jolicoeur

I got my first daylilies from Lewis and Nancy Hill, authors of Daylilies: The Perfect Perennial. I was hooked, and I add to the collection whenever I find a new or interesting variety — I probably have 15 different kinds. Daylilies really are the perfect perennial, and though most people think only of the traditional orange tiger lily that grows wild along roadsides and meadows, there are actually 1,700 varieties to choose from, according to Timber’s New Encyclopedia of Daylilies. I love the fact they have different bloom times, so you can have something blooming all summer long. Some of the flowers can be quite small, almost fairylike; others are tall and have large, fat blossoms. Still others have spidery-shaped petals. The centers and petals can be different combinations — you could have a light yellow with a deep raspberry/purple center — my personal favorite (second row, left) — or a golden yellow flower like the Stella Dora, a very popular one carried in most garden centers or nurseries (third row, right).

So that’s what’s blossoming in my yard at the moment!

—Maribeth Casey