Autumn Red Daylily (Heremocallis)

Red daylily with a golden throat, growing around 3′ tall with a 1-foot spread. It slowly spreads by underground rhizomes.

A re-blooming variety blooms in early July in my Zone5/6 garden.

Take a daily walk through your garden and remove the spent blooms on your daylilies. When the whole stalk has finished blooming, cut it at the bottom.

When To Cut Back Daylily Foliage

The best time to cut back daylily foliage is after the leaves have turned brown, usually in the fall. The rhizomes get their energy for next year’s flowering from their leaves. The longer you leave them, the more growth and flowers you’ll have next year.

Removing the dead foliage is also an excellent preventative measure for pests and diseases. Doing so in the fall leaves you more time to enjoy spring blossoms. Plus the weather is usually more conducive to garden cleanup than in the spring because it’s not raining every day.

How Do you Divide Daylilies?

Divide Daylilies in the fall or early spring for the least stress on the plant but they can be divided anytime. Dig a clump up, removing most of the soil so you can see the roots. Separate them into individual clumps using 1 fan. (A fan is one set of leaves.)

Alternatively, shove your shovel into a clump, remove a portion and replant. You’ll see some die-offs of some leaves this way from the ones that didn’t have roots attached. Daylilies are a hardy crowd, they’ll survive as long as you make sure they have enough moisture.

Do Daylilies Make Good Cut Flowers?

Their name tells you that the bloom only lasts for a day, but you can cut them and put them in a vase! Each bloom still only lasts a day but the others on the stalk you cut will continue to bloom when you remove the spent one.

Take a container with cold water to the garden with you. Once cut, they need to be placed immediately into water. Cut the flower stalk as close to the bottom as you can. Let them sit for a few hours to rehydrate. Cut the stalk once again for the size that you need for your vase. Enjoy their fleeting beauty!