Can I have some advice on when to remove dead daylily foliage? I'm in zone 6. Some sites say remove it when you begin to see new growth--which I have on many of them. Other sites say wait until any danger of a hard frost is over; not sure when that would be, though our last frost date is May 15, which is a long way off! What has been your experience with this? Thanks very much for your advice!!!

I like to remove my dead foliage when it forms a mass of dead leaves that come away very easily when pulled on. My plants are mulched well in the fall, so they are not depending on the dead leaves for protection, and in our mild winters it would not much matter any how. So really the only reason I do it is just to keep the garden tidy looking.

If the dead leaves pull away easily enough I pull them off frost warning or not whenever I can get outside to do it. I've cut them way back in fall and did not lose any daylilies. This year, I'm pulling dead leaves in the spring. I'm in zone 6b.

with what's been said above. I like to keep things neat!

Our last frost date is also May 15, and we removed the dead
foliage near the end of February. Here, evergreen or semi-evergreen
plants can't seem to unfurl and push the new foliage beyond the dead stuff
without removal, and could be subject to rot. We also help the plants
to unfurl by pinching the tops off where they are stuck together.
Dormant type foliage needs no help at all, but we do remove the
dead stuff on them also.

Each year is different in the timing though. It depends on the
number of warm days and moisture the plants get and how fast
they seem to want to grow.

We've had quite a bit of rain lately and I agree with shirlee. I noticed as I was pulling off the dead leaves that the new growth was pretty saturated. Getting rid of dead leaves hopefully will help dry everything out.