I have started a flower garden on a front sloping hill at my house. Because of my heart I can't mow it safely anymore. I have planted several different types of day liles and lilies. My questons are;
Do the day lilies (bare root) fade back a bit before they get going?
How long does it take for the bulbs to establish roots and show growth?
I spent a good amount of time studying what and how I was going to plant the hill, turned and enriched the soil, and fed both the bareroots and bulbs when planted.
Have planted some other plants and bushes along with these.
I am realy excited about how it will grow and look.
Thanks Chuck
Lily and Day Lily planting
Chuck, the bare root plantings may show growth in a couple of weeks. The bulbs a little longer.
Andy P
chuck,
the daylilies will be up before you know it. They will hold your hillside soil nice and tight. I have had daylilies grow from just broken pieces of root that I forgot to clean up when I moved them. They should be fine.
Marthas
You may want to mulch your hill so that soil isn't blown or washed away before your plants get established and to help keep an even level of moisture while they get established. I have a steep hill with shrubs and daylilies and a few other spreading perennials and I keep it mulched to help hold the soil and keep it more evenly moist as well as to prevent weeds from moving in. I have to pull a few weeds a couple of times a year - that's all I do. For the first year you may need to water if there's a long dry spell. My hill is several years old and I renew the mulch every two or three years, just adding a light layer on top of the old. I've found that a very textured mulch holds better, and isn't as likely to work its way down the hill. I also have edging where the hill bed meets the grass to keep the grass from growing into the bed.
Also, you may have problems with the lilies. There is a beetle that eats them, and while your part of New England may not have them, you may find that they get eaten. I don't want to use heavy duty pesticides, so I've simply stopped growing bulb lilies and now grow other bulbs and daylilies, which aren't bothered by the red lily beetle.
Thanks NHBabs, I did mulch the hill after planting. The area was at one time a lawn (in name anyways), We planted the bottom half last year with Vinca for ground cover and I turned over the top 12'x25' feet this year. I home tested the soil and was surprized how good it was. We worked in a good amount of topsoil over the whole area. Each plant received bone meal and some time release 10-10-10 fert. The holes were filled with mixed top soil and well rotted MooDoo. We applied the mulch at about 2" - 3" and are watering using a misting drip hose.
I did a lot of reading before I started. Hope I covered all the bases.
Thanks again, Chuck
wow. stand back. those plants will be shooting out of the ground in no time!
Martha
Chuck - to avoid damage to the lilies you might want to buy a package of colored golf tees and use one for each lily as they emerge. It may keep you from digging into the bulb by accident.
Good luck with your plantings. Did you keep the names and give them nameplates or some kind of tags?
Chuck, my passion is Lilies and daylilies....sounds like you did everything right! As far as the lily beetle, if you haven't seen them yet...you will. I won't stop growing lilies because of a bug!! I love them too much and have a battle going on with them. The first year the beetle won, last year I won and plan on winning again this year too! Good luck and enjoy!!
I lost most of the lilies in my garden beds away from the house because I couldn't keep up with the hand picking. I planted some in a large pot near the door and they did just fine, but if I missed a day or two, they would win. I kept them for several years in the large pot through the winter outside and there is one left now. I have to keep an eye on it. dang whoever let these things in!! I don't think I have had 20 Japanese beetles in the 23 years I have lived here, but these seem in endless supply.
I hope they don't cross Long Island Sound!
Pirl, I have placed plastic markers where ever the bulb are and have a detailed map of placement.
About the bugs. I, along with alot of people really don't want to use chemicals in the garden or anywhere else. I was reading about "organic pesticides" in an article. Has anyone heard of or used, Diatomaceous Earth? It sounds like something I might like.
Jap Beetles haven't been much of a problem around my house lately. Now that I've said that I'll have to start a waiting list for available flowers! They use to strip my rose bare years ago. Don't they make some type of trap for them?
Chuck
I planted a row of daylilies last Spring behind a row of established clumps. They were single fans that I got off ebay.. They did grow , and one or two of them actually produced flowers last summer. They are all coming up now, but I was surpised and a little disappointed to see that they look pretty much like they did last year- single fans. How long does it take for daylilies to really fill out and multiply? ( I guess I was thinking that they were fast multipliers).
The one thing I experienced last year with mine were thrips- never noticed them in previous years, so I will be doing all I can this year to prevent that again.
With all the talk about beetles I just found this great site about bugs.
http://bugguide.net/node/view/15740
Hope you can use it if you don't already know aboutit.
Chuck
My daylilies are slow to multiply too. In a year they went from 1 fan to 2-3 fans. Is that common?
The soil is heavy clay. I did dig in some leaves and mulched with shredded leaves in the fall.
Also this an area is by the road and gets hot and dry during summer. I don't have the hose
reaching all the way to water the end of the bed too.
I did see that left alone long enough daylilies get so dence you can't see soil at all and look kind of
weedy.
Well, I'd be happy if my single fans had gone to two or three this year, but it looks like that is not gonna happen. So I guess I'll just have to be happy if they all put out flowers. I wonder if certain varietes multiply faster? Mine are an old one, "Pink Damask", ...also, the soil was good and I think I have them in a good spot.
It takes about 3 years for a daylily to "clump" and be at its peak. If you live in the Northeast and are buying evergreens it could take longer. I recomend semi-evergreens and dormant varieties for the Northeast. Don't get me wrong, there are some evergreens that do well here, "Pandora's Box" is an excellent evergreen for the North, but I have had some evergreens just up an die after a year here. Some don't even make it through the first winter, I learned the hard way!!!!
Noreaster - I have many that don't expand as I would think they would and others that go on a growing spree and it's hard to keep them divided and find homes for them. I'm beginning to believe that if we're not crazy about a certain daylily that is precisely the one that will expand as we wait for the ones we love most to put a move on.
Yeah, that is probably how it works, huh?
I just went out, in the rain, and moved some mulch aside, hoping to see another fan about to pop up under there- no such luck! Funny thing is that after I got mine from ebay and planted them all, I happened to stop at a little out of the way nursery and found that same cultivar growing in nice sized containers- a couple fans per container, with scapes already. So I bought two and planted them because I was desparate to see what *mine* were gonna look like the following season. Shoot, if I had known it was gonna take three years for the ones I planted to look like the two I bought at the nursery, I think I would have just splurged and bought a few more mature ones. The ones on ebay were very inexpensive, of course...I think I really just lack the patience gene that is probably rather important in gardening.
How about fertilizing daylilies- what to use and when?
Pixie, I didn't even know that there were "evergreen" daylilies...I just looked mine up and they are dormant, so I guess that's good.
You can get seedlings also. you go out to the garden and there is a new daylily plant where there wasn't one last year and it's a seed that sprouted. Who knows what you will get? They aren't roots expanding because they are too far away from the mama plant. I only have a couple of yellows that do this. I guess the hybrids don't set fertile seed.
Martha
If you had a garden of either only diploids or only Tets you'd get seeds that grow. Often people keep many seedpods believing each seeds will become a plant but if the bee put the diploid's pollen on the Tet you won't get plants from the seeds, if any develop.
Pirl, you may have answered an old question.
I have both Di & Tri-ploids. I have to hand polinate the Tri to get seed.
Thanks for the info.
Andy P
Glad I could help.
The bees must be doing it right, cause I get seedlings. I have long since forgotten any name these yellows had. but I have moved the seedlings out. a few grew to blooming size and were yellow also. I don't keep the seed. Just let the flower stalks dry out and then pull them for the compost. No seedling unlike parents yet. thanks for the botany update!
Martha