BETTY BEARDSLEY  (Laffin 2023)  41" tall,  7" bloom, Mid, Tet, Dor, 3 branches, 25 buds

                            DF $60

 

Betty Beardsley has had a long history. When Curt Hanson first came out with the very tall Chew Mailpouch Tobacco (Bela Lugosi x Tet H. Altissima) in 2012,  I was crossing it with everything, looking to get tall seedlings. I didn't get a single one with a pretty flower, but I did get some awesome scapes and plants, the best one being a cross of CMT x Melanie Mason's Dangling Participle. The color was muddy but it had amazing plant vigor and killer, well-branched scapes.  So even though the flower was not good, I refused to throw the seedling away until I got a good kid from it. 

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I crossed it with many many different daylilies without luck, then finally hit the jackpot when I crossed it with Building the Colossus and Betty Beardsley was born: big, beautiful purple blooms and strong, well-branched scapes (three branches spaced about 4" apart to allow for an open display of blooms with no crowding). 

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As nice as her flowers were, her primary value has been as a hybridizing parent.  Time after time when I'm going through the seedling beds to select the keepers, I look at the tag and Betty is one of the parents. Beautiful blooms and great scapes. This year a third of my selected seedlings had her as a parent, and that's from a season's crop where I used dozens of different parents.

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Betty Beardsley is easily fertile both ways, and adjusts easily to moving. Increases nicely. Dormant, very cold hardy (she easily withstood some seriously cold temps in not just this winter, but many previous ones) and totally rust-free.

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Betty Beardsley the person was the wife of one of my favorite cousins, universally loved for her kind and caring disposition, good sense of humor, and great baking skills. The petal color of this flower reminds me of Betty's blueberry pies, which regularly won first prize at the Blue Hill Fair. This led her to enter the Maine statewide blueberry pie contest, and by golly, she won that, too! She couldn't believe it, since  blueberry pies are almost a religion in Maine, and so many people pride themselves on their ability to make great ones. So winning the best blueberry pie in the State was a lifetime achievement award for Betty.

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Betty also loved daylilies. She came to my place one day years ago and bought a couple dozen plants that she and Tony planted around their small summer cabin on the ocean.  She loved them and grew them very well - visitors always remarked on their beauty. When she became ill in 2022, she asked that some of her ashes be spread in her beloved daylily gardens.

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She died in October, and this daylily is lovingly dedicated to her. One of the best people any of us has ever known. 

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