Viewing post #739397 by CaliFlowers

You are viewing a single post made by CaliFlowers in the thread called Deep Colorfast Purples?.
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Nov 25, 2014 12:16 AM CST
Name: Ken
East S.F. Bay Area (Zone 9a)
Region: California
Tina,

Do you have a lot of trouble growing dormants?

I grow Strutter's Ball and Bela Lugosi, and both perform well here. Strutter's Ball is underground already, Bela Lugosi is still holding a leaf or two. Curt registered it as a semi-evergreen, but it tends to lean toward the dormant end of that spectrum.

Here, Strutter's Ball is probably more of a true purple, if I had to judge between the two. Bela Lugosi seems to have a just a tad more red involved in the color, but I really like the look of its "velvet pile" finish, which adds both sparkle and darkness, making the color "pop". I think it's also a big factor in sun-resistance. Bela Lugosi tends to open a bit more reliably than Strutter's Ball, which can have a stiff petal or two, but that shouldn't be much of an issue with your warm evenings.

I'm in Zone 9, but probably a good deal north of you. Because of marine influence, our summer nights cool off rapidly after sunset. The cool weather intensifies/darkens the color in a lot of daylilies, (if there's any "mud" in the mix, it will definitely show up here) and adversely affects their sunfastness, as the segments are often not adequately pumped by morning. They still have their share of good days, but when a cool night precedes a day in the upper 80's with clear skies and 30% humidity, even some of the pastels can show afternoon damage.

Nona Ford's Norman Lee Hennel is another purple I'd recommend - it has interesting color, a refreshing green throat, and performs very well in the garden. Like many purples, it's not as red as the ATP images depict. It's a tetraploid, not a dip as registered.

John Benz's Imperial Conquest is very nice, one of my favorites, and might have the best substance of them all. Even here it opens nicely and holds well.

Another great one is Curt's Den of Iniquity, which has exceptionally clean purple color, as well as one of the brightest and cleanest green throats I've ever seen. It's also not as red as its ATP image, but at least the ATP images depict the correct flower -- the AHS database image is way off in form as well as color, and I suspect it might actually be a picture of Curt's Night Deposit).

Ken
East S.F. Bay Area
USDA Zone 9
Sunset Zone 15

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