A visit with our friend, Mike Georges

Mike Georges seedling [Vampire Fangs X (Randy Stephens X Venus Fly Trap)] WOW!

                                    Mike Georges Venus Fly Trap seedling

This past summer I had the good fortune to have Mike Georges, Dave Mussar, and Bryan Culver visit my garden.  Any time I get to talk daylilies with actual hybridizers is much more enjoyable than the locals who pull in my driveway when I'm trying to back out. LOL. Anyway, I have grown a couple of Mike George's intros and this seemed like a great opportunity to get to know him better, so with nothing further here is my interview with Mike:

Mike Georges and Dave Mussar

Introduction written by Mike Georges

My birth came as a shock to my parents, especially my father, since they were not aware my mother was carrying twins.  After my sister was born the doctors broke the news to my parents that he was pretty sure there was another baby, patiently waiting to come out. I was born in 1947 in the town of Gaspe, situated on the very East coast of Quebec.  I was 4 when we moved to Montreal, 15 when we moved to Pierrefonds on the West side of Montreal.  Met my wife there, married, had two kids and went to work at a pharmaceutical company.  At 33 I decided to go back to school to get my PhD at the University of Waterloo. Graduated at 38, got another industrial job, made a discovery that eventually lead to a position at the University of Toronto as a teacher and researcher in organic chemistry.  Retired at 65 and that is where I will be until…, well you know. 

1. How did you first get involved with daylilies?

Mike: I do not remember how I got involved in daylilies.  I always liked growing plants and at one point had a basement full of Africans violets. When my wife and I moved to a house with a backyard I started growing some daylilies as garden plants.  I found out from the internet how easy it was to hybridize them and thought I can do that. A bit later I found out about the Ontario Daylily Society and joined. 

2. Which daylily hybridizer or hybridizers influenced you in the beginning?

Mike: I do not think that there is one hybridizer who influenced me.  Right from the start I was attracted to bright colours, reds and burgundies, and without knowing much, that is the direction I went off in. Initially I had a few seedlings I was quite pleased with.  However, after a few years of hybridizing Dave Mussar and I visited Bryan Culver’s place, my first time there, and I was amazed at the seedlings he had and realized that if I was going to ever introduce anything I had to up my game a lot because my seedlings paled big time in comparison to his seedlings.  I actually left Bryan’s place very discouraged.  

Bryan Culver and Mike Georges

3. What were some of your initial goals for your daylily hybridizing?

Mike: My initial goals were to have bright, blemish free red and burgundy flowers. And most importantly, they had to be free of thrips damage.  Both of these goals were challenging. I was quite ruthless at the beginning of my hybridizing program. If a seedling showed thrips damage, no matter how nice the flower, they were dispatched to the chopping block.  I also composted a lot of daylilies I paid big bucks for that showed repeated thrips damage. I never used them in my hybridizing program.

Chopping block:

The Chopping Block!

4. How do you garden?

Mike: I try as much as possible to not use chemicals in my garden.  I keep my gardens relatively small so that I can weed them by hand and not have to use herbicides.  I make my own compost from shredded leave, grass clipping and house scapes.  I was buying horse manure for a number of years but unfortunately two years ago the horse farmer moved away.  I did some vermicomposting for a number of years but never felt I made enough compost this way to make a difference in my garden. Plus, my wife was always complaining about having the worms in the basement.  Unfortunately, my soil and well water have a high pH so I do need to use something to lower the pH.  Rain water works of course and I collect it in five 50 gallon barrels.  But in a drought when I need to use my well water I acidify it with ammonium sulphate.  

5. How many seedlings do you grow each year?

Mike: I grow anywhere from 600 to 1200 seedling, depending upon space, how lazy I feel in the spring and how good my crosses were the previous summer.  In November or December I take all my seeds and separate them into three categories, top priority, second priority and third priority. All the top priority seeds get planted.  A selection of the second priority seeds also gets planted but none of the third priority seeds make it into the ground.  Crosses that seemed like a good idea in the summer often don’t seem like such good crosses in November. I am at the stage where most of my seedlings are either from my previous introductions or seedlings that are either bridge plants or future introductions. 

6. What are some of your favourite daylily introductions from others?

Dr. Celia Stump (Larry Grace)

Mike: The one daylily that will always remain in my garden is Dr. Celia Stump.  I bought it when it was first introduced and paid $300 for it.  It is the best daylily investment I have ever made. All of my toothy seedlings, futures and previous introductions have Dr. Stump somewhere in their background. Since I am not a display garden I usually only keep a daylily in my garden when I am hybridizing with it.  When I am done using a plant it is either given away to a friend or donate to the Ontario Daylily Society for their auctions.


7. What are some of your favourite daylilies that you've introduced?

Mike: For a long time my favourite introduction was Boulevard of Broken Dreams, and it was, and still is, one of my best sellers. It has bold colours and, in spite of it being a darker coloured daylily, it is free of water and thrips damage. Last year I introduced Midnight Romance and it has narrowly pushed Boulevard of Broken Dreams out of first place.  Midnight Romance is a 9” flower with excellent colour and 5-way branching on a 38” scape. Other introductions that continue to attract my attention are Not Named After My Wife Linda, Ghosts in the Attic, Designed to Impress, Vampire Fangs and Phantom Fangs.

8. What are your thoughts on branching?

Mike: Branching is important and it is great if you can get 5-way branching, as long as the branches are spread out.  However, I think 3-way branching is adequate.  I will say the same thing later about bud count but I would prefer to have a flower that appeals to me, even it is on a 2-3-way branched scape, than to have a flower that does not appeal to me that is on a 5-way branched scape. 

9. What are your thoughts on bud count?

Mike: I do not particularly care for plants with excessively high bud count.  I deadhead every night so that in the morning I can see the new flowers unobstructed by older flowers in different stages of dying off. Thus, I do not want plants that have a 50 bud count.  Too much work.  A bud count of between 15 and 25 is ideal to me.  One can get an extended season quite easily with plants with that bud count, especially if the plants, once established, have a reasonable number of scapes. 

10. What do you think the future of the daylily will be in the years to come?

Mike: I don’t know.  There is a trend now towards patterned, stippled and broken patterns daylilies.  I have to admit none of those appeal to me so I will answer this question by saying that I not the go-to person to find out what strange trends are going to be popular in the future.  It just seems to me that if the flower is different, no matter how unappealing it is, it will eventually be a trend. 


Here's some of Mike's favorite introductions:

                               Boulevard of Broken Dreams (Mike Georges) 

                                    Candlelight Romance (Mike Georges)

                                        Phantom Fangs (Mike Georges) 

                           Not Named After My Wife Linda (Mike Georges)

                                          Vampire Fangs (Mike Georges)

                  Designed to Impress (Mike Georges) Photo by Paul K. Lewis

Here are some of Mike's seedlings slated to be 2020 intros:

                                        Mike Georges 2020 introduction

                                        Mike Georges 2020 introduction

                                       Mike Georges 2020 introduction

                                    Mike Georges 2020 introduction

Here are some of Mike's Dr. Stump seedlings:

                                     Mike Georges Dr. Stump seedling

                                 Mike Georges Dr. Stump seedling seedling

                                        Mike Georges Dr. Stump seedling

                                     Mike Georges Dr. Stump seedling

and a few other seedlings of note:

                                               Mike Georges seedling

                                             Mike Georges seedling

                                             Mike Georges seedling

                                            Mike Georges seedling

Wood ducks in Mike Georges pond

Thanks Mike for taking the time to share your program with us.  Special thanks goes to Dave Mussar for sharing some of his pictures as well.  You can view Mike George's website at http://www3.sympatico.ca/ohbehave/Index.html   Next interview we have lined up is Brian Reeder. Happy holidays to every one!