Daylily Dividing in 3 Easy Steps

Too many Daylilies.  Said nobody.  Ever.

Probably the most known and common method of propagation is digging up the root ball and dividing the rhizomes. This can be done most anytime the plant is not in bloom. Ok, I admit, I have dug and divided them while in bloom but I can’t think of any reputable garden source that recommends this method! Generally, most sources suggest tackling this task in fall or early spring.
daylily divisions
1. Dig up the clump

2. Divide by pulling or cutting apart the root ball

3. Trim as needed, replant or share.

Another, lesser known, method is to harvest the proliferations. After the daylilies have finished blooming and before the stalks turn completely brown, it’s a good time time to check the scapes for proliferations. Cut any you find with about 2 inches of stalk remaining and pot them up. Don’t have any pots around? Put the ‘baby’ in a glass of water. Be sure to label them so you’ll know “who’s who” in the spring.
Keep them in a sunny window for the winter before transplanting them back into the garden come spring. This proliferation will be an identical twin to the parent plant.
Daylily ProliferationsIn just a little time, you have increased your supply of lovely daylilies for your own garden or as gifts to your family and friends.

Bringing In the Trees

I like to have a few houseplants. They cheer me up in the winter, and a few potted plants scattered through the garden in the summer add interest. Plus, it brings back childhood memories. My mom had a schefflera that she bought in a small pot — maybe a one gallon size — that grew into an enormous plant that she loved. I remember her washing each leaf individually with soapy water when it got infested with aphids.

But things can get out of control…Right now, I have a red rubber tree, an orange tree, a orange treelime tree, a palm tree, a hibiscus, a corn plant (that would become a tree if I put it in a bigger pot), a peace lily, and a cactus — and a house with a few, small windows. Each one of my houseplants has a story, and I love them all, but it may be time to let go of a couple.

The palm and peace lily were part of a dish garden that someone sent when my mother-in-law passed away. In my mind, they are reminders of her. I don’t think I could part with them unless they were going to stay with one of her other children.

Similarly, the orange tree belonged to my father-in-law, aka Pap or Pappy. He took care of it for 30 years! He kept it on a table and supported the branches with strings attached to hooks in the ceiling. He didn’t take it out for the summer; it stayed on a table on a little sun porch where his washer, dryer, and deep freezer were. Several times when we visited for Christmas, it had tiny oranges all over it. They never got quite as big as golf balls, but they did exist!

When Pappy’s loved ones noticed what meticulous care he took of the orange tree, they added to his citrus collection: he also had a lime tree and a lemon tree. My brother-in-law took home the lemon tree, but we ended up with both the lime and the orange. They are not doing as well under my care. They are living, but in the last three years we haven’t seen an orange. (Probably because I’m not a faithful with the fertilizer. I understand they are heavy nitrogen feeders.)

My children gave me the cactus. It is one of the toughest plants I’ve ever seen. When they gave it to me, it was very small, and had one of those colored balls from another plant grafted on top. The ball on top collapsed and seemed to rot away. I gave it up for dead and put the pot in a window sill in my laundry room and forgot about it. At some point, the pot got knocked off and it landed on its side between the wall and the dryer. Unbelievably, when I found it, it was still alive. I repotted it and it started growing. A year or two later, it developed black spots all over one side (it may have gotten too cold next to the window). Again, I figured it was a goner, but it recovered again. That thing will probably outlive me and my kids!

The red rubber tree came from Aldi — the grocery store. It was $2 and in a one-gallon pot. It was cute. The red rubber tree LOVES living at my house. It’s huge. Giant. Behemoth. It’s five feet or so tall, and at least three or four feet around. I think that I love it simply because it appears to love me so much. Alas, it’s the one that really needs to go — partly because it’s so giant, and partly because it doesn’t honor anyone’s memory.

But the point of this post is that things can get out of hand if you have too many houseplants. We brought the citrus trees in last week when the temperature threatened to dip near freezing. The orange tree is in the middle of the kitchen and pokes me every time I open the oven or the fridge. I have no idea where the rubber tree will go. Every window will have as many pots crammed around it as possible. At least we’ll have good indoor air quality, right?

 

Mystery Plants

Do you have plants in your garden that are a mystery to you? Being a very relaxed gardener, I usually have a few mysteries in the garden: plants that I just don’t know much about. At the moment I have two. One is a seven foot tall beauty that looks like some variety of rudbeckia.

mystery yellow flower

mystery yellow flower

The other is, I think, in the mint family. I didn’t expect these beautiful flowers.

mystery purple flower

mystery purple flower

In the spring time, I wrote about a different kind of mystery — when you plant something, like an iris or a tulip and you don’t know what the bloom will look like. You do, however, know what an iris or a tulip generally looks like. In the case of these two plants, I had no idea. A friend sent them to me in early spring when they were both basically just roots in a clump of dirt. She didn’t know the name of the yellow one, and I’ve forgotten what she told me about the purple one.

Watching the foliage grow, then seeing the flower buds develop, and finally enjoying the beautiful blooms made for an entertaining summer. They are adding so much color to my late summer garden, too — which is nice because it seems like the majority of my flowers are spring bloomers.

Have you had any surprises this summer? Or, have you ever planted something having no clue what you would end up with?

 

It’s Your Garden, Grow It (or Not) If You Want To

If you hang around with gardening-types, it’s bound to happen. You’ll eventually come across someone who criticizes your garden choices. They may think you should be growing more native plants, or more edibles, or more heirloom varieties. You may encounter someone who feels that your method of weed eradication is inferior to their own. The criticism may come in the form of helpful “advice”, or it may be outright. Either way, it could well make you feel uncomfortable.

Don’t let it.

If you have put seeds in the ground, gently cared for seedlings, watched birds flutter among your blooms, or watered your plants on a hot day, you deserve kudos for cultivating life.

Gardening is a creative endeavor. It allows us to enjoy color, texture, and scent in a way that other creative pursuits cannot. People choose to garden for a million different reasons, and nearly every one is good. Maybe you grow your own food in a conventional vegetable garden; or perhaps a vase of fresh-cut flowers on your dining room table makes you happy so you have a cutting garden; some people garden in order to attract birds and butterflies; others grow herbs for cooking and medicinal purposes. The point is: it’s your garden, grow what you want to.

At Green Thumbs Galore, we love to encourage people to try new things. We are happy to share our favorite plants with you, and offer our tips and tricks. But, if you choose to do things differently, you still get a pat on the back from us!

cat walking in plants

Newman in Ice Plants

Happy New Years! Winners from our Garden

I had some ideas for a post yesterday, unfortunately, something went wrong with WordPress and I was unable to log in and write. So you’d think, I’ll just write it today.

I am learning that that isn’t quite the way it works as my ideas from yesterday have poofed into thin air while I slept. Maybe you can relate to this experience and maybe not. But I used to be able to remember EVERYTHING, yes SIREE! I do remember I was planning to write about the Winners in my garden in 2013. The plants that just stood out and gave my garden that special oomph and brought a smile to my face when I walked out with my morning coffee. I posted pictures of some of them on facebook over the last few days and I am proud to say that I figured out how to insert the pictures into this post!

Happy 2014 to you and yours – may health and happiness find you and may your garden be all that you hope for with few weeds that can easily be pulled!

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