Background history:

'Lava Flow' is a semi-evergreen tetraploid introduced in 2005 by Smith-FR.

It has earned the following AHS awards:
PC: 2010

This plant can be found in our Plant Database at:
Daylily (Hemerocallis 'Lava Flow') .

Please join in, if you own this plant! We would love to know more! I award an acorn for performance information posted to this thread.



Also, please consider adding a Plant Performance Report to the database! Thank you!

Daylily (Hemerocallis 'Lava Flow')

A very intense color, among the earliest to bloom here. Its bud count will win no prizes, and it blooms at a time that cold weather can spoil blooms. Multiplies well here.

This year's bud count was the best I have seen. One scape here has eight; another ,5.

I fell in love with this plant this year! It was a huge surprise to find it with scapes so early in May. I had it in a huge 16inch flower pot and so it really stood out.

It gave me my first blooms of the season on June 2 (zone 5B) and then produced several more scapes and bloomed for quite awhile.

It is now in the ground and is front and center for next year! Can't wait to see if it blooms this early again!

Lava Flow has been in my garden for two growing seasons. This photo is one from last year. In that first season, it started blooming July 8 and continued until Aug 1, early for here. Height last season was 24", bud count of 8 on 2 way branching. It was moved so this year, just getting re-established. Increase has been good with doubling of fans over the two year period. This one stands out in the garden because of its intense coloring early when little else is blooming. Seems to handle our freeze/thaw winters well.

Bought this one in the fall of 2016. It bloomed in '17 and '18. Not the highest bud counts, but it has sturdy scapes, is fertile both ways and self fertile. Since I don't have a lot blooming in the beginning of June, I've selfed it and gotten nice pods with good seed counts. The seeds collected in '17 are nice sized seedlings this year. Not much for increase, three big fans in my clump. I did note that LF will make short runners and can pop up new fans a few inches away from the mother clump. I broke one off that had a three or four inch rhizome with a slender 4 leaf fan. So next year Ian should have a report for Lava Flow...

The pic is from mid June.

Great looking flower, but the bud count is poor. Rarely does it get above 8 per scape.

David (Zone 5)

2019- Was moved at the end of 2018. No fan count for 2019- I have record of scapes up on June 5, 2019. This is one of the earlies in my garden. Lava Flow selfed seedlings bloomed (similar coloring, bigger eye, flowers melted in the heat- none worth keeping) Lava Flow x Paul Aucoin seedlings also bloomed and were kept for 2020 (good color and substance).

2020- This lovely plant got moved in 2019 (in late July, no less) and I have a fan count of 8 listed for it this spring. I noticed scapes nicely up on 2 fans with a third poking out

Lava Flow is a great plant. I planted it in the Spring of 2021, it came in off the LA with a bud that flowered that year. By October 2021 it was up to 4 fans.
This summer, after losing a fan over the winter, it has grown to 7 fans. LF began flowering June 23 and went until August 1, with over 40 flowers. The flowers are blindingly bright and cheerful…can't miss these! It's not an EE here but definitely an E to EM. Maybe next year it will bloom earlier.

2023 update…not as long of a bloom time, June 22-July 11, very much an Early this year. Not as many blooms counted as last year but at least 30 and probably more. As others have noted, it's a real wow presence in the garden before others have gotten swinging. It did end with 8 fans though, that's one more than last year.

2024 update

Lava Flow grew 3 fans to start the season with 11 fans. It bloomed from June 18- July 13 with over 70 flowers. It still wasn't the earliest flower here ( that was Orange Prelude, on June 1) but among the earlier ones.