Red Lane Gardens 2008
Gardening Zones, Foliage and Hardiness
One of the beauties of Daylilies is how many of them will grow well across a variety of Zones. There is even an AHS award for this - the Lenington Award. (A list if them can be found here.)
Red Lane Gardens is in Zone 5, but I grow many cultivars that were hybridized in much warmer zones and they do just fine. Zone assignment is based on when certain plants bloom, but it does not take either altitude or latitude into account. So gardeners in the US mid-West, who are also in Zone 5, have plants blooming much earlier than I do - on average 2-3 weeks earlier. And I know someone in Zone 4 who can ship plants 2-3 weeks before I could ever consider it.
So it makes assigning a Zone for hardiness purposes nearly impossible with Daylilies.
Foliage type is often interpreted as an indication of hardiness. Dormants for the North, Evergreens for the South and Semi-Evergreens for everywhere else.(??...personally I question whether there really is foliage that fits the semi-evergreen classification). I have lost to winter-kill many more 'soft' dormants than hardy evergreens.
I tend to not pay too much attention to foliage type when ordering new plants. I give much more weight to the hybridizer and a plant's geneology (if available) than any other factor.
All in all, like many other gardeners, I figure any plant is worth a try if I like the looks of it and if it has to die a couple of times in my garden before I get the hint, then so be it.<LOL>
One of the beauties of Daylilies is how many of them will grow well across a variety of Zones. There is even an AHS award for this - the Lenington Award. (A list if them can be found here.)
Red Lane Gardens is in Zone 5, but I grow many cultivars that were hybridized in much warmer zones and they do just fine. Zone assignment is based on when certain plants bloom, but it does not take either altitude or latitude into account. So gardeners in the US mid-West, who are also in Zone 5, have plants blooming much earlier than I do - on average 2-3 weeks earlier. And I know someone in Zone 4 who can ship plants 2-3 weeks before I could ever consider it.
So it makes assigning a Zone for hardiness purposes nearly impossible with Daylilies.
Foliage type is often interpreted as an indication of hardiness. Dormants for the North, Evergreens for the South and Semi-Evergreens for everywhere else.(??...personally I question whether there really is foliage that fits the semi-evergreen classification). I have lost to winter-kill many more 'soft' dormants than hardy evergreens.
I tend to not pay too much attention to foliage type when ordering new plants. I give much more weight to the hybridizer and a plant's geneology (if available) than any other factor.
All in all, like many other gardeners, I figure any plant is worth a try if I like the looks of it and if it has to die a couple of times in my garden before I get the hint, then so be it.<LOL>
Design and photos
© Nancy Oakes
© Nancy Oakes