I've been a gardener all my life. Flowers in particular have been a passion since before I could even walk, according to family stories, so a college degree in botany was a natural path. There is no doubt that getting my hands in the dirt to grow plants is second nature and feeds my soul. At first my hands were getting dirty by growing nice big vegetable gardens on the land that was available with home ownership beginning in 1979. My love of perennials developed quickly thereafter. Beginning as any typical perennial gardener discovering the habits of different plants through trial and error, I soon concentrated on the easy care but high performance of hostas and daylilies.

Gardening grew to become a major part of my life which lead to a Landscaping Certification degree in 1990. In 1992, I, along with my kids and much of my perennial garden, moved across the state to Grand Rapids. It took a year to find the right piece of property to have a new home built so in 1994 I began gardening anew on a blank slate of construction ravaged land. My typical cul-de-sac subdivision lot has a mix of sun and shade which gradually transitions to a naturalistic woodland setting on the adjoining property. Clay is the virgin soil here so my Troy Built rototiller and I became best friends as I worked to incorporate huge quantities of organic matter and sand to make friable loam for the gardens I envisioned in my mind. Those gardens changed and expanded dramatically over many years but more recently, being 30 years older than when I moved in, I have shifted to downsizing as the work continues to be a one woman effort.

My involvement with daylilies expanded to hybridizing in 1996. Not being able to afford the daylilies I saw in those beautiful glossy brochures of the day, I decided to use my botany education to try my hand at creating my own pretty daylilies. As a teacher, I had summers free to garden and sell perennials at a local Farmer's Markets. Some early dabbing success fueled my passion to continue. The excitement of seeing beautiful new seedling faces each summer never fades.

As my son and daughter grew up and developed their lives away from home, our once large and spectacular vegetable garden was slowly replaced by a working daylily garden to accommodate my seedlings and pod/pollen parents. Once I retired from teaching, I formally introduced my first five cultivars with the American Hemerocallis Society. I currently have 53 introductions with many more hardy beauties in the works for the years ahead.

I plant 400 seedlings in the ground each May. Only 10-15% of each year's newest-to-bloom seedlings are deemed 'keepers' which must surpass older selects to earn a place in the evaluation beds. Even during the winter, I'm assessing the potential of the seeds from the previous season and planning new crosses for the next summer. Ruthless culling is the name of the game around here!

I enjoy my membership and participation with the American Hemerocallis Society - Region 2, the American Hosta Society, and locally, the Grand Valley Daylily and West Michigan Hosta Societies. Meeting fellow plant people during visits to local, regional, and national events is always fun.

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