We purchased our property in 1986 in the farmland surrounding the city of York. York is best known, perhaps for briefly hosting the Continental Congress, and for its adjacency to the Gettysburg battlefield. Our 3½ acre property was a piece of the Ruppert farm which has been developed into 1-5 acre parcels. The original barn still stands on our land and the two former farmhouses exist only as foundations which we have bumped into several times doing work on the property. We chose this parcel for the ½ acre pond that was used to support a disreputable poultry farm prior to our purchase.

We spent the first year reconfiguring the property to repair eroded areas and divert surface water from the pond. Our plan was to build a house and have some thoughtful landscaping but we did not foresee the extent of the gardens that would be created nor did we envision the start of a nursery business on site, or anywhere else. It was not difficult to transplant the 25 daylilies from our first house in York to the new site.

In 1987 we built our house using my design since I was an architect. We attended the AHS National Convention, in Washington DC in 1987 and discovered the daylily world, which we did not know existed. We met the Dittmers and Rowlings from Pittsburgh, and Stuart Morton, Darrell Apps, and Beth Creveling from the Delaware Valley Daylily Society. These people and many others became our inspiration for our daylily pursuits.

Our gardens grew without benefit of a proper plan because we did not foresee the daylily journey we were on. We had several hundred varieties when Diane noticed that our local nurseries had very few daylilies to offer. Diane started wholesaling dayllies to local nurseries who all needed a good source for new and unusual daylilies. One of the things that helped the sales effort was the signage we provided with a colorful bloom photo. Nurseries wanted the potted daylilies delivered early in the spring, so we constructed 3 hoop houses to over winter the potted plants and advance their spring start by about 3 weeks.

In the beginning, we had one weekend of retail sales. Gradually, we enlarged our retail business to supplant the wholesale business. Our perennial gardens were a big attraction for both new and experienced gardeners. Our garden was focused on daylilies, and we concentrated on summer blooming companion plants, so the garden put on a great show during July. We viewed the garden itself as the marketing tool for the sale of potted daylilies and this meant deadheading the entire garden 5 days a week. Together with several student summer employees we would begin liveheading the garden at 3pm, when the nursery closed, to be ready to open at 9am the next morning. Peak season required about 16 man hours of deadheading each day. By 2015, it was time to close the nursery and reduce the workload.

Our garden is, more or less, a semi-circle surrounding our pond. A bridge leads to an island in the pond where the focus is a stone fireplace and small patio. The garden beds are wide and either sloped or mounded to provide some elevational interest. We too often have drought periods during our summer, so we installed drip irrigation in most of the garden. We have many perennials planted with the daylilies including hydrangea, acanthus, and peonies. The conifers we planted in the original garden quickly became too large and have been replaced with dwarf conifers. Areas with a lot of shade have become hosta gardens. Because we are amateur gardeners, we try many plantings or vignettes that are not successful. My design background taught me that not all ideas are precious and therefore I am content to replace unsuccessful ideas with new ideas. Diane is careful to arrange plantings with specific color combinations so most every daylily I plant gets relocated, at least once.

As we approached our 7th decade it became clear that we had to find ways to reduce the garden work. Each year we replace some garden beds with lawn and we have robots that mow the lawn. Dwarf conifers have replaced daylilies in some area. Plants are replaced with different plants that require less work. So far, the less is more concept is winning because I think the reduced garden areas have improved the overall garden appearance.

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