Booms & Blooms 2010

Daylilies (Hemerocallis hybrids) are the stars of the floral show at Powell Gardens right now and are the featured flower for our Booms & Blooms celebration on Saturday (July 3) of this Fourth of July holiday weekend.

Daring Deception Daylily is a magnificent modern hybrid with ruffled and picoteed edge and a marvelous dark band on the petals and a contrasting green throat (flower center). All these floral attributes make quite a show! Daylily flowers each last only one day but many buds are produced on each scape (flowering stem). Some varieties now have multiple bloom times or are repeat bloomers later in the season.

Daylilies beckon at the entrance to the Perennial Garden from the trolley stop. We have more than 400 varieties on display: from varieties that are nearly 20 years old to new cultivars added last year.

Each day Jennifer Bolyard (Perennial Garden Senior Gardener) and volunteers remove the spent daylily flowers to keep them looking in premier shape for our visitors. Jennifer will be on hand from 3 p.m. until the Perennial Garden closes at 8 p.m. on Saturday for any daylily or gardening questions you may have. She is going to conduct a poll on which variety of daylily in the perennial garden is the visitor's favorite. Be sure to take a gander at all the daylilies, pick your favorite out and seek Jennifer to record your vote! I will report the favorite on the next garden blog.

Daylilies come in a variety of colors from white to nearly black. Ice Carnival Daylily is one of our good "white" daylilies. I took this photo this morning before it was deadheaded to show the older two flowers (left) which are pretty white and waning with the fresh creamier flower on the right. Many daylilies do fade some over the daytime and some even sunburn. We are happy that Bob McConnell owner with his wife Sue of McConnell's Plantland and regional daylily expert will be at Powell Gardens Saturday to sell daylilies and also answer visitor questions in front of the Visitor Center. I always ask Bob for his incredible daylily knowledge of which cultivars of daylilies are really great garden performers for our region.

Yellow Landscape Supreme Daylily has large, light yellow flowers and yes, is a great performer in the landscape.

Barbara Mitchell Daylily has more golden yellow flowers of large size and substance.

Condilla Daylily has vivacious yellow-orange flowers that have double the petals.

Copper Cannonball Daylily has super sized flowers with a coppery orange color that is quite intriguing and stands out among the rest.

Tomato Surprise Daylily is reminiscent of a ripe red tomato's color!

Jolyene Nicole Daylily is a good pink with ruffled petals of heavier substance.

Mokan Rose Daylily is a fine rose and hybridized by local daylily expert Bob Lennington (hence the name Mokan for Missouri and Kansas).

Rasberry Lehi Daylily (yes that's the spelling --not raspberry) is another good rose or raspberry red colored daylily.

Richard Connelly Daylily is a good transition from rose to red.

Scarlet Tanager Daylily is as vibrant as its namesake bird. I like how you can see the flowers are translucent (the light shines through the top middle flower). One really has to see daylilies in the garden in the intense post solstice, early July sun.

Hot Lips Daylily captures my attention in the red border every year. Its close to red flowers are heavily diamond dusted which gives it a sparkly sheen. Diamond dusting in daylily flowers is caused by tiny crystals in the flower's cells that reflect light: another reason to see these in person as the camera can't do it justice.

Satan's Dream Daylily is one of the richest fire red daylilies with a very nice contrasting green throat. With the thousands and thousands of cultivars, the names can be intriguing or bizarre and sometimes quite fun.

Bela Lugosi Daylily is a real dark red bloomer with some violet tones.

Africa Daylily is one of our darkest flowering cultivars. Be especially careful on selecting a dark one for your garden because so many of them really get bleached by our intense sun. Bob McConnell can help you with the best! I believe Jungle Beauty is one of our best dark daylilies. Be sure and look up the American Hemerocallis Society's website http://www.daylilies.org/ for all you need to know about this outstanding perennial flower.

Staff prepare the pontoon for the fireworks display on Saturday night. Come see the daylilies by day -- the Perennial Garden will be open until 8 p.m., then listen to the symphony until dark/9:30 p.m. when the fireworks display will top off your visit with colorful booms to compliment the colorful blooms of the garden. Happy Birthday to this great nation of ours!

Daylily Daze

Daylilies (Hemerocallis) are the epitome of bright summer perennials and Powell Gardens' Perennial Garden displays nearly 500 varieties in a landscape setting. Daylilies brighten the garden with light to dark colors from reds to oranges, yellows, greenish, pinks, lavenders, and near white; and combinations thereof. Many appear to glow with sunshine like this yellow in a sea of other colors. Every part of the daylily plant is edible but they are best as food for the soul or "eye candy" as I call them.


Daylilies are planted with appropriate perennials for pleasing combinations like pastel pink Lady Emily Daylily (lower right) combined with Highland White Dream Daisy (left), Summer Pastels Yarrow (upper center to right) and a pink-flowering Asiatic Lily (upper right quarter). You can get some great ideas for what to plant with daylilies in our Perennial Garden.


This plant combination includes the near white Gentle Shepherd Daylily (mid center and left) with White Swan and regular Purple Coneflowers, a hardy Easter Lily and sprigs of Plume Poppy.


Jennifer Bolyard, Senior Gardener in the Perennial Garden, poses with one of her favorite daylilies in the garden: cultivar Spanish Brocade. Each morning Jennifer and intern Sharon Rink remove the spent blooms off all our daylilies so they always look fresh and bright during your visit. Jennifer likes the bold, beautiful and dramatic cultivars.


Here is a closeup of Jennifer's favorite 'Spanish Brocade' Daylily. Look for it on the left side of the walk from the trolley stop into the Perennial Garden.


Intern Sharon Rink stops for a picture while weeding in the Perennial Garden. Her pick for favorite daylily is 'Lusty Leland' as she like the ones in bright, hot colors with a contrasting yellow throat.


Lusty Leland Daylily is a vivacious red. I once had a visitor couple chuckling near our mass of this daylily: turns out his name was Leland. Reading all the names of our cultivars is half the fun!


One of my favorite "reds" is 'Scarlet Tanager' with "diamond dust" making the flowers sparkle.


For a pink-red Daylily 'Fabulous Favorite' stands out on the walk from the trolley stop into the garden.


Mended Heart Daylily, a vivacious orange with darker halo, is Janet Heter's (Senior Gardener in the nearby Rock & Waterfall Garden) favorite.


Outrageous Daylily is aptly named and a perennial favorite of Perennial Garden visitors.


Lady Florence Daylily has some extra petals and a very glowing yellow-orange flower. We have double-flowering dayliles in the garden but most of us prefer the single bloom types.


MoKan Gold Daylily was hybridized by local daylily hybridizer Bob Lennington. It was mentioned by both Jennifer and Sharon as a top pick in the Perennial Garden.


Some daylilies are greenish, especially in the throat of the flower like this Priority Daylily.


One of our finest "purple" flowering daylilies is 'Rue Royal', there are good lavenders but no true purple and definitely no blue-flowering daylily.


There is a good range of pink-flowering daylilies. This is the sumptuous and frilled Holiday Frills Daylily.


The thick, smokey pink petals of Smokey Mountain Autumn Daylily make it a real show stopper.


The fun, bitone flowers of Chicago Candy Cane can really add some zest to a perennial border.


Old King Cole was a merry old sole but the daylily with that name is a most interesting bicolor!


The frilled picotee flower edge and dark eye of Daring Deception Daylily make it another visitor favorite.


The collection of daylilies at Powell Gardens shows a great variety in a beautiful setting. We have no collection policy for daylilies and have many older varieties as well as some of the newest hybrids. They have to thrive here and fit the color schemes or theme of each perennial bed so that you, our visitor, has a beautiful experience. I always like to stroll through with my camera or notepad and get ideas for my own garden and future garden designs.


Jennifer Bolyard and Sharon Rink will be in the garden to answer your daylily or perennial garden questions on Friday afternoon and evening for our Booms & Blooms Festival on July 3 (the Perennial Garden will be open until 8 p.m. that day). Regional daylily expert Bob McConnell (co-owner with his wife Sue of McConnell's Plantland in Columbia, MO) will be selling daylilies in front of the Visitor Center on Friday and Saturday (July 3 & 4), bring him your daylily questions and/or wish list and he will take care of you. We always appreciate his generosity of daylilies to Powell Gardens and his expert advice. He knows which ones really perform in our intense climate!

Painting with Perennials

Powell Gardens' Perennial Garden is ablaze with summer blooming perennials. The 3-1/2 acre garden has nearly 1,500 varieties of perennials. Walk along its brick paths and you will see many ideas on how to combine perennials into colorful compositions. Here are a few that captured my attention this morning:

This composition of hot colors is centered with a clump of Firehouse Asiatic Lily and surrounded by red-flowering daylilies (cultivar 'Al Baker' left, 'Indian Love Call' background and 'Scarlet Orbit' right). A red-flowering Mexican hat (Ratibida columnifera) in the lower right ties right in. This composition really gets the heart pumping and is not a good choice for a relaxing outdoor space.

Cool blue flowers like this Russian Sage (Perovskia atriplicifolia) contrast with warm red-flowering daylilies and enhance the beauty of each. Look for this composition and Russian Sage used as a backdrop to daylilies along the walk from the Trolley Stop into the garden.


Warm yellow flowers like this Savannah Asiatic Lily also contrast nicely with cool Russian Sage blossoms. These colors are actually complimentary on the color wheel--the lily is yellow and orange and the Russian sage is actually violet-blue.


The strong light of these near solstice days make yellow and white glow. The shady woodland backdrop reads black and really sets off the form of the plants as well. This spectacular stand of Compass Plant (Silphium laciniatum) is in the prairie border of the perennial garden. The white flowers are the native weed Daisy Fleabane (Erigeron annuus) -- we always leave a few for color but it does reseed too much and requires thinning and removal.


This stand of a similar and related huge perennial, Texas Coneflower (Ratibida maxima) would be more dramatic with a dark background. Even though yellow-flowering, this perennial is used in our "blue" border because of its green-blue leaves (and not its bold form). The coarse texture of the leaves also contrasts wonderfully with adjacent, finer textured (smaller leaved) perennials.


Even though solely in shades of green, the form of this native grass -- Bottlebrush Grass (Elymus hystrix) make it beautiful all by itself with a turf and woodland backdrop that don't compete with its delicate beauty. Bottlebrush grass is locally native in open woods and savannas and prefers some shade.

The smoky rose plumes of the Karley Rose Pennisetum grass echo the the smokey pink flowers of Sweet Sixteen Mallow (Malva). Both these perennials have performed extremely well for us and are showy for a very long time in the summer perennial border. You rarely see them in other local landscapes or gardens.


Back lighting really sets off some perennials. Light catching Sweet Sixteen Mallow and spiky steel blue Sea-holly (Eryngium) look even better with warm colored daylilies blooming in the background.


Pastel compositions are a favorite of many gardeners as the colors are soft and soothing. This composition is quite sophisticated with spectacular Highland White Dream Daisies (Leucanthemum x maximum), Lady Emily Daylily (lower right), a pastel pink Asiatic Lily and interwoven Summer Pastels Yarrow (Achillea).


Cool colors take the heat away from this hot day. The composition includes Blue John Veronica with the spiky flowers, a touch of Franz Schubert Garden Phlox (Phlox paniculata) and the leaves of Texas Coneflower for contrast.

Huge Variegated Giant Reed (Arundo donax 'Variegata') looks even better with a mix of Purple Coneflowers (Echinacea purpurea cultivars) at its base.

White flowers are very nice in hot weather and perfect for an outdoor "after work" relaxation space. These flowers will glow into dusk and shine in moonlight. Royal Respect L.A. Lily in the foreground and Flower Power Phlox (Phlox maculata) in the background really work well together.

Some flowers are so dramatic they are at there best all alone. This is the weak vining Clematis 'Florida Sieboldii' which always catches attention with its striking flowers.

The Perennial Garden offers many ideas of how to combine perennials in the home landscape. It provides garden interest at all seasons but from now through September it is at it peak of summer colors. All color ranges are utilized with areas themed for white, pastels, reds, blues; sun or shade, native plants, etc. There is surely a composition inspiring for you so bring your camera and pencil and paper to capture ideas to recreate at home.

All images taken by Alan Branhagen at Powell Gardens' Perennial Garden on June 26, 2009.