Callie,

It sounds like they need to divided. With any perennial, dieback in the center of the plant is a commom symptom of overcrowded roots. So is foliage that starts out green and lush but cannot sustain itself through the season.

Autumn is the best time to dig and divide daylillies. Divide each clump of roots into several smaller clumps and replant them. If you divide them into only a couple of large clumps, they still may be too overcrowded.

When you dig them up to divide them, check for gnawing on the roots that might indicate mole, gopher or vole damage. Discard any roots that are mushy or rotted or have an off-type of odor.

Daylilies usually need to be divided about once every 3 years. When you replant them, be sure you are planting them in good, fertile soil. You can add soil amendments to the planting site before you plant the root divisions, adding compost, cow manure, humus, or whatever your choice of soil amendment might be.

Deadheading does promote more blooms. I try to remove the spent scapes regularly.

Hope this info helps.

Dawn

Dawn- THANK YOU! What helpfull info!!!

So for the 2 large, origional beds, that are both really struggling already, should I bother to fertilze? It hasn't seemed to really help.
Since they are already struggling, would it hurt to divide and transplant them now?

Say these beds have been here 10 years....basically left unattended- do I want to disturb the whole bed (say in the fall).
because taking out the shovel's full over the past 2 years has not helped much. I guess I am saying...when they are this far in trouble, how much is enough to be rejuvinating?

one last question-
say all the blooms have fallen off and all there is is the bare stem. Do i cut that off? Will more blooms come from that stem? once bare stems, is that lilly done blooming?
Ok...that was more than 1 last question... :)

Thanks again!~
callie

Hi Callie,

Well, if it were me, I would dig up each and every one of them and divide them. If you piecemeal it, and dig up some here and some there, then you will have to do more next year and the year after and the year after. If you do it all at once, you should be good for a couple of years.

You probably could dig and divide them now, if you want to. Anytime you do that kind of chore in the summertime, though, you are more likely to lose plants to the extreme heat. On the other hand, in most of Oklahoma this year, extreme heat has not yet become a problem.

And...about fertilizing. What I am going to say will sound counter-intutitive, but think about it. Sometimes we humans want a 'quick fix' to an ailing plant so we reach for a fertilizer. In reality, though, the use of a fertilizer can actually make a plant WORSE by stressing it at a time when it is already showing signs of stress. It sounds crazy, but it is true. I was really slow to accept that fertilizer can stress a plant, but I know it is true.

As a mostly-organic gardener, I prefer to 'feed the soil and let the soil feed the plants'. You feed the soil by amending it with organic products like compost, manure (cow, chicken, rabbit, etc.), greensand, bone meal, blood meal, etc. Organic soil amendments feed the plants more slowly and are therefore less stressful for the plants.

With your daylilies, you might want to try feeding them a gentle organic liquid fertilizer like compost tea, liquid seaweed or fish emulsion. Liquid seaweed, in particular, seems to give a special lift to struggling, stressed plants.

With the daylily scapes, often you will get several buds on a stem, and the buds bloom in succession over a period of days or weeks. I snip off each individual bloom after it wilts, and don't remove the stem/scape until all the buds have bloomed and no more developing buds are obvious on that stem/scape.

Different daylilies bloom differently, but most of mine will put out new scapes of flowers for quite some time, and seem to put out more scapes if I remove the old ones promptly. Some of the newer daylilies bloom repeatedly and some bloom almost all summer long. Deadheading any flower tends to being on more flowers as the plant will put its energy into producing more flowers instead of producing mature seeds.

Dawn

Thank you Dawn! I found your advice quite helpful! If I can survive the mosquitos- the temp and sun don't appear to be comming back with a wrath, i will divide the whole lot of them! I never thought about my small clumps actually adding to the problem. I have no idea how long they have been on this property. It could be 7 years or 15? I have been here for 3.
I bet digging up and dividing them will improve them drastically- so say all the clumps that are flourishing now relocated. :)
Thanks again!
callie

Dawn - you wanna come over to my house and dig daylilies? I can't do it anymore because daylilies have the TOUGHEST tubers of anything I've ever tried to dig up.

Callie - this time of year, after they have bloomed, if you cut the foliage wayyyyy back, they will sprout new green foliage, too. That should help you out until diggin' time comes around.

Susan

Dawn, I want to thank you too for the detailed information. I just found out i was dividing mine wrong (in clumps) can now remedy the situation.

Daylilies will not bloom as well 1st year after transplanting in my experience too but will take off after that. And this summer is great so far for transplanting things.
vickie

They will even reseed, too! I have little spots of the common orange daylily that crop up all over my yard.

I have some bulbils of the lilium longiflorum 'Flore Pleno', which is a double blooming tiger lily if anyone wants to plant some in their garden. They are gorgeous! This is one of the few that produce viable bulbils.

I will also have bulbils of hardy begonia (B. evansiana) that are very easy to propagate (just by tossing them on the ground and covering a little) if anyone would like some of those.

Susan

Thanks again everyone!
I have not done a "bloomin" thing (pun intended)
with the beds. The sun has come out. I figure I will work them in fall.
I knew that like Iris, they won't usually bloom that first or sometimes even 2nd year. This would have been the glorious year for several of my transplanted clumps....they did give me a lot, but I wonder what they might have been had we been normal this year.
I will keep the board updated! :)
I would love to swap flowes with you susan! Although I don't know if I would know what I had, or if I would did it up right!
I call myself the good luck gardener.
I haphazardly plant things and say
GOOD LUCK TO YOU! I HOPE TO SEE YOU AROUND.

thanks again!
callie

Hi Vickie,

Glad the info was helpful. The first time I dug and divided daylilies, I had no clue what I was doing. I did notice, though, that the roots consisted of many interlocking segments of fingerlike roots. I was able to untangle them and pull them apart and get a lot of plants out of one overgrown clump. If you divide daylilies every 3rd year, it is easy to pull apart the individual plants. However, if you divide less freguently, the roots all grow together and have to be cut apart instead of being pulled apart. Ask me how I know that! :)

And, I agree that this summer's weather has allowed us to dig, divide and plant much later into the summer than usual. At least something good has come of all this rain.

It is really heating up here now, though.

Susan,

Guess what has not been blooming? My rain lilies. How is that for irony? I am sure they will bloom in August as usual, but I had thought that with all the rain we were getting, they might bloom more or bloom earlier.

Callie,

Be sure to drop in and visit often. We can discuss gardening (and other things) until the cows come home.

Dawn