'Ruby Stella'
Dwarf Day Lily
"Come back to me.
I walk beneath the shadowy multitude of towers;
Within the gloom the fountain
jets its pallid mist in lily flowers."
-George William ("A. E.") Russell
(1867‚1935)
(1867‚1935)
I planted 'Ruby Stella' on the roadside the day Marlon Brando died, & cannot but see it without hearing him shouting in anguish, "Stella!"
The flowers are about three inches wide, smaller than Hemerocallis fulva, but of an intense scarlet or wine-red.
It begins flowering late in June & is in its full glory in July. Unlike most daylilies, it reblooms throughout summer, with sufficient reliability that it is categorized as ever-blooming.Developed in Europe & introduced by Anthony Tesselaar International, it's a slightly fragrant, deeper red version of the yellow 'Stella D'Oro,' the first reblooming daylily.
Deadheading appears not to be necessary for it to keep blooming from June right up to the doorway of autumn.
'Ruby Stella' is a mid-sized dwarf clumper, a foot to twenty-two inches high. It is drought tolerant, but blooms vastly better with regular watering. Hardy in a wide range of conditions, it can be grown in zones 4 through 11.
The reblooming daylilies have been too often hybridized to assign them a species, but the two most important contributors seem to have been early-blooming dwarf H. plicata & the most reliable reblooming species H. middendorffii, both native to Asia.
Daylilies are edible & the sweetish red blooms make a lovely addition to a mixed salad. Since the blooms never return a second day, they can be taken late in the afternoon so as to have them first for the garden & then the table.