Thanks to Greg Haggett, as always, for being our resident photographer. Also, huge gratitude to everyone who donated time, energy, and plants to make our 2016 sale a success!
A little aside: I purchased Chinese Lantern at the sale (a plant I’ve wanted for a long time for those amazing dried seed pods it produces in fall!). When I emptied the pot, I noticed long roots stretching from sprout to sprout, not a single clump as expected. Alarm bells started clanging in my head. I hit the internet to read up on Chinese Lantern and discovered it can be aggressive in many gardens, especially in fertile soil.
At the moment, my plant resides in a plastic pot surrounded by cement on my front stoop. I’ll keep an eye out for little roots attempting to creep in search of soil and I’ll cut all seed pods to make sure it doesn’t send babies into my beds. Just an FYI in case anyone else picked one up, and not my personal bad experience this time, but I’ve battled enough plants with runners to know I don’t want to risk a new one taking over my gardens. 🙂
Another note, this one daylily related: My 96.5-year-old grandfather passed away on Friday. He was an amazing man–the Energizer Bunny incarnate–who was still mowing his own lawn and driving his own car, rocking bionic knees and refurbished heart, attending monthly poker games with my dad, and always, always telling jokes. He was an avid gardener for many decades (oh, the corn rows we used to run through as kids!), a lover of life and his family, and most of all a lover of his wife of 73 years. I know my grandma is missing her partner terribly right now (as is everyone in the family). Anyway, not to bring the room down, but I had a plant I was planning to register last fall and never got around to. I’m glad I didn’t. I sent in my paperwork Saturday evening for Hemerocallis ‘Albert Loves Wilda’. Fingers crossed it gets approved by the registrar. I know my grandpa would surely approve. ❤
-Kim
Connecticut Daylily Society 