sooby said: Thanks @Char it's not something I would use and it seems rather misleading, seeming to confirm the idea that somehow "dormant" daylilies are always hardier than semi-evs which are always hardier than evergreen, which is not the case.

From the AHS website: Foliage Habit "This term refers to the winter behavior of daylily leaves. Daylilies are either deciduous, semi-evergreen or evergreen. This indicates how the cultivar's foliage passes winters in the hybridizer's garden, but is not necessarily an indication of how it will behave elsewhere under differing environmental conditions. Note that hardiness and foliage habit are inherited separately, thus not all evergreens are tender and not all deciduous plants are hardy."

It's an imperfect system of rating daylilies for zone, much like the system used for other plants.
Foliage habit, hardy and zone will never be exact as far as growing daylilies goes. There are so many variables when it comes to a daylily surviving the winter....an evergreen that may survive zone 3 with heavy mulching and snow cover can winter kill in zone 4 or 5 with no mulch during a light snow cover or open winter. Does that make it hardy zone 3 or not hardy zone 4/5?
I think we all do what we can to try and ensure our daylilies get through whatever environmental challenges they face regardless of their registered foliage habit. Somewhere, maybe this thread, someone mentioned they had trouble growing certain hybridizers plants. I have also found this to be true.

Edit to add the two messages in the other thread that are part of this discussion.

sooby said: I wonder where those hardiness zones come from, because on looking up the zones for a few cultivars I have I see evergreens that should not be surviving here but are and non-evergreens that should be but have struggled. It doesn't seem to be automatically related to foliage type. @Char do you know where the hardiness zone range per cultivar came from? I remember Roycroft's doing a survey on the AHS email Robin years ago for certain cultivars and people could input where they grew and the zone. But that wouldn't cover all daylilies.

Char said: The zone range is a data set that is entered with new daylilies. I don't know who came up with it, guess it's a function of the NGA database. The way it works is
Dormant=zone 3
Sev=4a
Evg=5a

It's not perfect for all daylilies, but if there's images or comments you can see where the member is (most of the time) and Daylily of the Day can give you more info. When those don't work you always ask in the Daylilies forum.

And conversely, other hybridizers do great, especially the ones that are more local to one's own locale. Not surprisingly, as the Daylilies are experiencing similar conditions and did well enough originally to be registered.

I checked out the Green Pages as recommended and wonder if there's a way for another option to be added, "Do Not Recommend" which should only be selected with a provided review - not everyone has the same experience with a seller. I placed three orders this spring from Spring Hill Nurseries (not in the Green Pages list though Breck's is and I think they're both owned by the same conglomerate). The first order had not arrived after nearly six weeks and I eventually canceled it. Only one of the multiple plants ordered in the second order actually grew - Bletilla never did come up. The third order was for two Flame Thrower Redbuds and when those arrived they were the deadest sticks imaginable. I contacted Spring Hill and they wanted to give me a "store credit" for a future order. It took some persuasion but I finally got a refund. I didn't bother with the other plant order, just wrote that off and vowed never to order from them again.

And I thought growing daylilies would be easy, boy what I know now, or I should say what I dont know now. I'm not sure what to do about the whole zone hardiness issue. I initially ignored folliage type because pretty much everything looks dead here in the winter anyway and assumed all daylilies were as hardy as Stella's; then realized that the database had different zones listed and thought to myself "hello how did you miss that". I then thought I put 2 and 2 together and figured out why my "Becky Lynn" (planted last year) didn't survive the winter. I put a semi evergreen in a small pot, unknowingly breaking my made up rule, zone 3 or below survives here in a planter with no protection. Has worked for 20 years and it's hard to kill a daylily anyway right. Apparent to all but not me, sooo wrong. Then I went about uprooting all the semi and evergreens that I planted in a planter and put them in the ground. And thought, Eurika, now I have it. Sooo wrong, again. And if I had any musical abilities I could probably make a country song out of this saga, ("My Becky Lynn" yeah that's all I can come up with right now). How about Shakespeare? Oh Becky Lynn, how have I killed thee, let me count the ways... yeah, i dont know Shakespear either. Well to not make a long post longer, it seems based on the information everyone has shared (many thanks) I should buy from local hybridizers (or daylilies hybridized in my zone) as that would be the best indicator of zone hardiness. Makes total sense, not being sarcastic. There's one like 20 or 30 minutes from here. Now if I can just stop looking and clicking "add to cart". But that brings me back to why I started reading the posts here, there's no "add to cart button", I can read about daylilies, look at daylilies, but not be tempted to buy them right. Soo wrong. [Mental note to self, posting while tired = long rambling posts, don't hit the 'finished" button]

It's all good. We know what we know and keep learning. Some of them are going to die or be puny. You won't always be able to predict the pattern. Other insults to daylily plant wellbeing will come along. But daylilies are lovely and will offer you unexpected delights, making it more than worthwhile. Ups and downs, with a sum gain.

There are several FB groups (Daylily Buyers' Review Forum, Daylily Buying- the Good, the Bad and the Ugly...) that focus on reviewing daylily sellers. You can join if you wanted straight feedback on sellers. Feedback isn't sugar-coated.

This reminds me to complain to K Van Bourgondien for sending me dead-as-a-doornail phlox plants and the wrong kind of fern...

Passionate4gardening said: you miss that". I then thought I put 2 and 2 together and figured out why my "Becky Lynn" (planted last year) didn't survive the winter.

'Becky Lynn' did not survive the winter here either but I'm Zone 4. I do have evergreens, semi-evs and "dormant" (deciduous) daylilies that have survived 20 or more winters often with little or no snow cover during the coldest periods. I've also lost the odd one, again of all foliage types. There is often an assumption that those of us in severely cold climates have abundant snow cover throughout the winter, this is definitely not the case.

As Char said, the hardiness zone system is imperfect, and I would add that's the case especially for herbaceous plants. Since it is derived from air temperature it works better for woody trees and shrubs where the perennial parts are also above ground to actually experience those temperatures.

Having said that, I'm very disappointed to learn that NGA is arbitrarily assigning minimum zones 3, 4 and 5 to all daylilies depending on their registered foliage habit. For determining suitability for purchases that is actually worse than not having the zones listed at all!

There's no way all daylilies registered as "dormant" are all hardy to zone 3, or all semi-evs to zone 4 or all evergreens to zone 5. Any of the three could be cold hardy or not in any of those zones. Not to mention that a cultivar can have a different apparent foliage type somewhere else compared to how it was perceived by the hybridizer where it was registered.

Zone ratings should be based on an individual cultivar's performance in gardens, not blanketed across a whole registered foliage type. If that can't be done then they are better left off.

End of rant

Near the top of my list of "things I wish I knew about daylilies" would be the total confusion that exists among daylily growers about how to recognize evergreen, semi-evergreen and "dormant" (deciduous) daylilies and the importance of these "foliage habits" to the adaptability of the individual cultivars.

The importance is not only confused but exaggerated and therefore misleading. I've read reports by many growers in a variety of climates that many evergreen daylilies grow well in some very cold zones. And conversely, many "dormant" (deciduous) daylilies grow well in warm climates with little or no cold period. Also, traits like vigor and floriferous-ness are not determined just by the foliage habit. So, for example, simply being evergreen doesn't mean a daylily will perform well in warm climates in all the ways we value.

It's well established BY EXPERIENCE that the only way to know the actual adaptability range and overall performance of a daylily cultivar is BY TESTING ITS GROWTH in various climates and soils.

The database already lists the registered "foliage habit" of each daylily. So anyone who chooses to be influenced by that greatly misleading and potentially erroneous description already has it.

By adding additional "information" on the supposed maximal cold tolerance of a cultivar based on nothing but the registered foliage habit, the database is actually making possibly erroneous ratings based on a nebulous trait. It is worse than making no statement at all!

As others have stated, a better piece of information would be the location and zone of the hybridizer who registered it. That's at least one location where the daylily should perform well. Then buyers know how far they are expecting the daylily to extend its adaption if they try it.

A useful guideline for new collectors is to buy daylilies from local growers who have had it for at least 2-3 years. This only works for those of us who are collectors of garden flowers rather than for use as hybridizing parents.

Hybridizers of "cutting edge" daylilies often have to buy untested daylilies to stay on the edge. They usually know the risks they are taking, and they already know whether they want to consider the plant's foliage behavior as part if their crossing goals.

"Advanced collectors" with years of experience don't need theoretical hardiness ratings either. I just joined NGA last year after growing and collecting daylilies for over 40 years. I didn't even notice that "minimum cold hardiness" rating was part of the dataset - I just glossed over it!

Now that I know it's there I strongly encourage eliminating it! It simply duplicates a generally useless bit of confusing "data" (foliage habit) which may be completely inaccurate and then assigns an UNPROVEN, UNTESTED but supposedly precise bit of "data" (exact cold hardiness rating) based on that useless and possibly incorrect datapoint. That makes it an even worse rating. It should be deleted from the database!

Pat (Ph.D., horticulture and plant physiology)

I've split this off from the thread it started in for those that are interested in following or commenting and to allow the other thread to continue with other on-topic comments.

I agree with both of you, but there are a few things to think about....

1) We, meaning the Daylilies forum or members can't just change a major data section of the database.
2) The base registration info comes from the AHS database and then is modified to allow us to search various features of a daylily. This is not the official registration database it is an informational database. Before you jump on me that the info being discussed is incorrect.... I agree with you.
3) Adding hybridizer location would be an EXCELLENT addition to our database. The how and changes needed, for instance even the hybridizer search feature would need some corrections, and only way I know to add location with a hybridizer would be manually using the code which is like...2 miles long. Unless there's a way for Dave to use the info for Hybridizer and State and get it programmed into the daylily database. I don't know, I don't even know if he'd be willing to do it.

I've copied @Calif_Sue to this thread and she has forwarded info to Dave. We'll see what he says.

@Char I certainly did not intend my post to sound like I was jumping on you at all! Sorry if it seemed so.

I only meant it as an objective critique of that rating. I don't know who made the assumption that this was a reasonable interpretation of the foliage habit. But I don't intend it to be a browbeating of anyone. I don't want or expect anyone to point fingers if they agree it should be changed.

I would just like to see it eliminated because it is an inaccurate use of "foliage habit".

I don't expect to see foliage habit eliminated from the NGA database. It is sometimes indicative of the plant's behavior. And growers do have legitimate reasons to choose one extreme over the other. In warm climates growers often prefer to have green leaves year round. In cold climates growers often prefer the ease of removing leaves that naturally died to the ground. Some growers in warm climates appreciate that, too. So much easier than grabbing off a dead leaf here, a dead leaf there. Out with the old, in with the new!

The problem sometimes is in knowing how well a given hybridizer assesses the foliage habits of their introductions. Some just use the same category for all. For example, Pauline Henry registered all her hundreds as "dormant" (deciduous) but growers have discovered some are evergreen.

Certain warm climate hybridizers started registering all of theirs as "semi-evergreen" and pushed the claim that these were adapted to all climates- definitely not true, so the buyers learned to beware, an expensive lesson sometimes.

Those are just a couple illustrations of how little value the claimed (registered) foliage habit has, but we are stuck with it.

We have to rely on educating growers, but it's very difficult when there is so much misinformation and misunderstanding drowning out the voices of experience.

Is it possible we could form a team of willing volunteers to enter city, state, and USDA zone for the hybridizers? If it's possible to make a new field and add entries by relating it to the hybridizer's name, a lot of entries could be made by, for example, making one entry for all daylilies by "Henry-P." - Siloam Springs, AR, zone 7a.

It would add even more value to the database to add the Köppen classification of that climate - Cfa (humid subtropica) for Siloam Springs. Fewer people are familiar with this system than the USDA zones. And yet, Köppen classifications are much more meaningful in predicting adaptability. If the database included a field for it, more people would become familiar and learn to recognize its value.

Pat

As Char pointed out, daylily forum cannot just change an entry used by many other gardeners. Would it not just be simpler to include a note to the effect, 'Buyer beware'? (Even cars with backup cameras flash a warning that the driver is still responsible for any collision, and should be alert / visually clear the surrounding area when backing up.)

Or just a polite note suggesting that people do a bit of research before ordering ... Daylily of the Day often gives valuable info on how well a daylily performs in different zones - just reading the threads is a huge library of information.

And some of us just 'ignore' hardiness and foliage ratings anyway (not pertinent to my climate). I notice Maurice basically said the same. So, even if the data is listed... why does that automatically presume gardeners can't recognize that those notes are just guidelines...?

Pat, I didn't think you were jumping on me personally. I realize it can sometimes be frustrating when there's info that we, knowledgeable, daylily folks feel should be corrected and discussions can get...warm..

I think you hit part of the nail on the head when you said "We have to rely on educating growers, but it's very difficult when there is so much misinformation and misunderstanding drowning out the voices of experience."
Sadly this applies to almost everything daylily at one time or another.

Not only may the programing by Dave be a huge task but sorting the info that gets entered could be a challenge as well. Hybridizers move, meaning the cv may have been hybridized and registered when in a completely different state/zone.
The registered foliage habit from the hybridizer would not be changed.

adknative said: As Char pointed out, daylily forum cannot just change an entry used by many other gardeners.

That's not true and NOT what I said. I said the Daylilies forum can not change a major data section of the database.

Char said:
1) We, meaning the Daylilies forum or members can't just change a major data section of the database.

Changes or corrections by forum members to the database entries CAN be made, there's actually clickable links for that already in the database. They will require approval though, before the change or correction is done.

Yes I can imagine adding the hybridizer's location and/or zone would be complicated. That's probably why we don't already have it. I don't know how many hybridizers move but I know that Patrick and Grace Stamile hybridized and registered daylilies while living on Long Island, NY, then in Florida, and now California. So it would require sorting out those. With a sincere effort I don't think it would create more misinformation than drawing conclusions based on registered foliage habits. But it's not likely to be done, I know.

Deleting the existing "minimum cold hardiness" rating field from the database should not be a huge challenge from the programming standpoint. It only exists in the daylilies database. From my ancient knowledge of database programming there would be a simple line of code somewhere stating something like "If foliage = "dormant", then write minimum_cold_hardiness = "Zone 3…" else if foliage = "Semi-evergreen" then write minimum_cold_hardiness = "Zone 4…" else if foliage = "Evergreen" then write minimum_cold_hardiness = "Zone 4…". The exact wording of the statement depends on the programming language but the logic is the same.

Pat

I would certainly like to see a history of the locations where hybridized of all plants in the AHS database showing the city and state or zip code . But I think a more workable situation would be to just include that info going forward, I could live with that.

Larry @seedfork
That seems like it would do-able, I hope it will be considered! It would still require a chunk of data entry to set up the first year's entries because there are a lot of hybridizers registering daylilies. After the first year I'd expect a lot would be repetitions.

Pat

I'm not sure where to start. So as a daylily newbie, this is what I have: Becky Lynn, semi, didn't survive winter in planter. Little WIld Flower, semi, in planter next to Becky Lynn, survived winter. Little Wild Flower, Stamile, 1997. Sometime in mid 1990's moved from Long Island to Florida. 3- 5 years (assuming) from seed to registration. (As Char pointed out, complication, moving locations). Becky Lynn, Guidry 1977, now in Louisiana, life interrupted research so notes stop there, and not sure if back in 1970's was in Louisiana. Looked up Greywood, hybridizer, 20 minutes away. Has greenhouse, is this fact, the greenhouse, a further wrinkle or complication? Also, although newbie, I'm interested in hybridizing. I have Dormant daylilies ordered 2 or 3 weeks ago coming early September. Hybridizer in South Carolina. Wondered if I should cancel but I have spent countless hours researching in terms of parentage, kids, certain traits etc. Purchased these newer registrations, along with other older dormant varieties from other sellers for specific hybridizing goals, cancelling the newer registrations would effectively cause a domino effect in terms of hybridizing. I do use and rely upon USDA hardiness zones. I know from experience, that if I plant anything zone 6, (my zone 6b) it may or may not survive in ground, i avoid these perennials unless I'm willing to accept it not surviving the winter. (I understand microclimates in certain gardens, snow cover, mulching etc.). I understand different daylily cultivars have different growth habits, (some cultivars multiply faster than others, just as an example); some cultivars may perform better in the South than in the North; and newer cultivars of course you just never really know in terms of performance. I totally understand and can accept this but not being able to rely on cold hardiness and just winter survival of a plant, I'm not sure what to do. Also should point out that Little Wild Flower, hasn't bloomed yet and it is from that seller last year that I have 2 mislabeled plants from so far, but this plant is one with a label.

Yes, greenhouses would render the "hybridizer location" information useless.

Hi K @Passionate4gardening

Orion is correct that a greenhouse complicates the evaluation. It depends on how the hybridizer uses it. Some just use one for sheltering potential parents from not just cold but also rain, hail, deer, and other hazards. They may grow seedlings in the greenhouse initially but plant them in the open for growing on and maturing. In those cases there would be no difference in the tested hardiness as expected for that zone. But if the plants never left the greenhouse they're only sure to be as hardy as the "climate zone" maintained in the greenhouse.

If you are buying new, untested introductions it's reasonable to ask the hybridizer if he or she has an expectation of the hardiness range. Sometimes hybridizers have pre-tested their intros with trusted friends in other zones.

You can also make an approximate estimation based on the hardiness range of the parent cultivars, if known. Cold hardiness is generally a multi-genic trait. You would expect the seedlings of a cross to be equal to the average hardiness of the parents. That's a generalization but it's a reasonable theory to work from.

For example, 'Little Wild Flower' is from a cross of 'Bubbly' x 'You Angel You'. Both are widely grown and hardy here in 6a. You could look for daylily sellers of those cultivars to see whether anyone in your zone or a colder one is growing it. This only works for somewhat older cultivars, of course.

You can also look for "child plants" on the NGA database. For example, 'Buckeye Rose', a lovely rose small double with pale edges, was bred by Steve Williams here in central Ohio zone 6a from a cross of 'Little Wildflower' x "unknown". This means Steve was growing 'Little Wildflower'. He grows everything outdoors in the ground, so it is hardy here and grows well, otherwise he wouldn't have used it.

OFC the database doesn't give the information that Steve is located here, and if it did it probably wouldn't say everything is field grown. So we have to do our own scouting.

The forums and database here on NGA are valuable resources for information. You could try starting a thread asking to "Please share your experience growing daylilies bred by (S Carolina hybridizer you mentioned)". You could add "in zones as cold as 6a".

You could also ask for reports on the performance of a specific cultivar. Or for information about the growing practices of a specific hybridizer.

I hope you have a lot of fun hybridizing and the seedlings are as beautiful as you hope!

Pat

plasko20 said: Yes, greenhouses would render the "hybridizer location" information useless.

. Although I seem to be spinning my wheels trying to figure it all out, I cant say how much I appreciate the discussion of the issue and everyone's contribution based on experience, education or both. In addition I'm impressed by the recognition that it is an issue and the different ideas being shared towards a solution. I have a background in law. Yes, useless in most ways for plants. But, when I find my research leads me down a rabbit hole, I go back to the basics. For the issue relevant here, leads me to the question, how is the hardiness of any perennial determined? Is there testing done? Does it depend entirely on the type of perennial or can it be said that most perennials go through certain testing, understanding of course that there are exceptions. If there is certain testing done on most perennials, is there a reason why it's not done with daylilies? I appreciate everyone's understanding thus far that this is all new to me (including posting in a forum) and I'm just trying to learn all I can.

Pat, thank you. Your post posted while I was finishing mine. I will ask the hybridizer if the hardiness of the plants I am buying have been tested in other zones. You also raised another question I had, which is as to parentage, one of the dormant plants coming from South Carolina has 4 parents listed. Of the 4, 3 are dormant and one was evergreen. Something I just recently (last night) went back and made note of, but yet not sure how to use this information. I am going to start with asking the hybridizer and hopefully the plants have been tested in other zones and my inquiry at least to these particular plants can end there. Thanks again for all the information.