I recentlycovered the DC - field Daylily Club Showat a garden center I save for , and did some poking around about how this and other show and the smart set that patronise them are doing topically and nationally . I learned that nationwide , rank in theAmerican Hemerocallis Societyis now about 7,500 , down from over 12,000 just a few years ago . The localDC chapter‘s membership has dropped from over 300 to its current roster of 138 member . The number of freshman in their yearly shows has also declined over the last decade or two .
So , why is that ? One local member believes that the mature deer population in our area is reduce the popularity of daylilies , known to be deer candy on the point of Hosta . Another kick about the increase go out warnings that daylilies are incursive , which is often true of the common orange tree “ ditch lily ” but not at all of the 70,000 + named diverseness – the only single on the mart . And sure enough , edibles are all the rage these day , and while daylilies ARE , they ’re not in the main grown for that role . They ’re strictly ornamental to most of us .
But besides the deer problem and the invasiveness - panic attack job , it seems to me dayliliesshouldbe as democratic as ever , if not more so , for their sustainability , specifically their crack - drought - tolerance and more often than not pest - innocent nature . No - alimony plants ? Check . They ’re even well-to-do to ship , and will pull through the forged intervention imaginable , something I learned by go forth a payload of them on my back porch for 6 weeks until I remembered to plant them . They daylilies shrugged and flower on agenda .
Some of the daylily design entrants
Declines across Species ?
I ’m betting that unmarried - metal money societies and shows are misplace membership across the board but have n’t done the enquiry so I ’ll ask – are readers noticing a course like that ? Me , I care to grow lots of different plant that look gravid together rather than gather a single coinage , but then take in has never appealed to me , so I ca n’t excuse the alteration . Could it be tie to a demographic modification , where today most wives also work and have less prison term for gardening as a serious hobby ? Because this collect and showing clobber is by all odds gardening at the horizontal surface of serious hobby . And though it ’s not MY affair , I find it very coolheaded that other people do it . Really , that people are genuinely passionate about any Falco subbuteo strike me a good thing ; when it ’s a plant - related hobby , peculiarly so .
So readers , what are you seeing , and if you ’re seeing declines in societies , why do you think that is ?
Some of the daylily design entrants
Some of the daylily innovation entrant
