Are You Supposed to Deadhead Daylilies?

Daylilies are such easy perennials to grow and keep healthy that gardeners sometimes forget that they appreciate grooming like any other garden plant. Deadhead all types of daylilies to improve their vigor and performance.

Identification

• The American Hemerocallis Society defines deadheading, or deheading, as "removal of spent flowers during the bloom season." The base of a spent bloom will snap right off the bract below it.

Function

• Spent blooms should snap easily at the end of the green bract.

  Deadheading not only improves the appearance of daylily scapes, the branches that hold the flowers, it stops the seed-forming process. This frees the plant to work on blooms rather than pouring resources into seed production.

Benefits

• Deadheading encourages "re-blooming" daylilies like Stella de Oro to produce more bud-laden scapes. Deadheading keeps decaying matter from dropping into the daylily crown. It keeps the area clean and less hospitable to fungus like those that cause crown rot and daylily rust.

Considerations

• Always remove the entire flower from the bract, including the base that holds the seed capsule. Remove scapes once all of the flowers have bloomed to make room for new buds to divide into new crowns. Leaves that yellow or fade after the plant’s bloom is nearly finished should also be taken away.