The Daylilies are blooming their little hearts out right now. Daylilies are in the genus Hemerocallis which has about 15 species of daylilies. They are not part of the Lilium genus, which is the genus for true lilies. The name Hemerocalliscomes from the Greek words ἡμέρα (hemera) “day” and καλός (kalos) “beautiful”. Especially in China, the daylily symbolizes motherhood.   Their name alludes to the flowers which typically last no more than 24 hours (about a day or so). Daylily flower stems are called "scapes" and as one fades, the next one on the scape opens, keeping daylilies blooming for weeks or even months. Daylilies have been dubbed the ‘perfect perennial’ because their wonderful features: they are pretty low maintenance, beautiful colored blooms, tremendous drought tolerance, and they can grow in most zones.    Brevities   #OTD  On this day in 1850, The Sydney Morning Herald shared an advertisement from plantsman John McMahon.   McMahan advertised that he had put together a catalogue of nearly 2000 species of plants. For his customers, McMahon assured that, "Plants securely packed for long journeys, glazed plant cabins prepared, and filled with rare plants for transmission to Europe."   #OTD  Today is the anniversary of the death of botanist Charles Theodore Mohr who died on this day in 1901. Charles Mohr was one of Alabama's first botanists. He was born in Germany and educated in Stuttgart - he was a trained pharmacist. Mohr traveled the world before settling in Alabama.  He collected in Surinam, emigrated to the United States in 1848, took part in the California gold rush, lived briefly Mexico, Indiana, and Kentucky. Mohr spent decades gathering the information and plant specimens for his work. In 1857 he started Chas. Mohr & Son Pharmacists and Chemists in Mobile, Alabama. His personal herbarium specimens were donated to the University of Alabama Herbarium (15,000 specimens) and the United States National Herbarium (18,000 specimens). When Mohr's book on the plants of Alabama was published, he was seventy seven years old. The following plants are named for Charles Theodore Mohr: Andropogon mohrii (Hack.) Hack ex Vasey Mohr's bluestem Grass family Aristida mohrii Nash Mohr's threeawn Grass family Eupatorium mohrii Greene Mohr's thoroughwort Aster family Marshallia mohrii Beadle & F.E. Boynt. Mohr's Barbara's buttons Aster family Rudbeckia mohrii Gray Mohr's coneflower Aster family Silphium mohrii Small Mohr's rosinweed Aster family Tephrosia mohrii (Rydb.) Godfrey pineland hoarypea Pea family Quercus mohriana Buckl. Ex Rydb. Mohr oak Oak family     #OTD   The poet, George William Russell who went by the pseudonym AE, died on this day in 1935. Russell attended the Metropolitan School of Art, in Dublin. There he  met the poet William Butler Yeats Russell became the editor of The Irish Homestead. His popular quotes include the following:   "Our hearts were drunk with aa beauty our eyes could never see."   "You cannot evoke great spirits and eat plums at the same time."     #OTD  Today is the anniversary of the death of one of the 20th century's leading landscape architects; Sir Geoffrey Jellicoe.   Jellicoe was multi-talented, but his true passion was landscape and garden design, which he described as "the mother of all arts". He was a founder member of the Landscape Institute. Over his 70-year career, Jellicoe designed more than 100 landscapes around the world. Jellicoe designed the John F Kennedy memorial site by the River Thames in Berkshire. Jellicoe’s final and most ambitious project was the Moody Gardens in Galveston, Texas. Jellicoe imagined a design where visitors could walk through the history of landscape, from the Garden of Eden and the gardens of ancient Egypt, to a design inspired by Thomas Mann’s novel The Magic Mountain (1924). As the Moody Garden website acknowledges, "It was the culminating work of his design career but has not, as yet, been implemented. We live in hope." Jell