El Glorioso is my goofy clown daylily: its gigantic, floppy blooms sit on top of a rather short, stubby body of leaves and scapes. Five years old, it has never bloomed for more than one month, if that. This year it stopped blooming after one month, then a few weeks later, sent up new scapes, started blooming again, and continues to bloom as of this writing. Who knew?
Close relatives all blooming at the same time: Cordovan Skies, Pink Charm, and the ubiquitous tiger lily. Cordovan Skies and Pink Charm were both bred directly from the tiger lily. Pink Charm (center, partially hidden by a Cordovan Skies blossom) was the first pink daylily ever bred. The three cousins begin blooming at different times: tiger lilies first, Cordovan Skies next, then Pink Charm, so catching them all blooming at the same time is a phenom that lasts a week or two at most.
Daylilies that begin in mid-August and last into September can be considered "late" and serve to brighten the garden when other flowers have quit for the season. Some will last through October if there is no sustained freeze, but their behavior changes. With cold nights and shorter days, their blooms are often smaller and less colorful. Even more interesting, they can take two days instead of one to bloom and fade just as slowly.
Late Summer Rose is still blooming in October--very late summer indeed! But she's blooming over two days here, Oct. 8 (left) and Oct. 9 (right)--same individual flowers!
Here are October versions of other late daylilies compared with their August/September selves (on the right):
Vt. River Promenade in Oct.
Back to School in Oct.
Though diminished, these October versions are petite and sweet, as they bravely hold off winter.
When a freeze is predicted, one can cut scapes with good-sized buds on these late bloomers and bring them in to flower indoors.
Rose Water, one of my not-so-late late daylilies went out with a splash! All the rain has sometimes meant extra big blossoms.
For years, I've rescued milkweed from being mowed down or strangled by vines, but this is the first year I've actually seen monarch larvae eating the milkweed. One caterpillar formed its chrysalis not on the milkweed but among the gladiolas. The chrysalis hung by a thread but survived storm after storm, finally "hatched," and out came the butterfly, who disappeared for a time, but later feasted on the flowers of our butterfly bush.
Monarch caterpillar on milkweed.
The chrysalis
A brand new butterfly feeds in the well-named butterfly bush.
I am forever pulling vetch out of my daylily garden, but these common, volunteer daylilies make a pretty picture mingled with vetch.