That sounds right. Shasta daisies bloom in June-July and by now they are spent, with maybe an occasional flower here or there, and are done blooming for the year.

Karen

you sound like somewhat of a newbie ...

your first mistake.. was planting 6 of one thing...

you have now learned that any given plant.. has a pretty short bloom season ...

my best advice.. no more than 3 of anything ... and 4 groups ... at least one for each season ... plus some bulbs ...

spring = bulbs
then you will need some plants for:

june
july
august
and fall ....

not much blooms in august... but sedum comes to mind ...

fall.. your standard mums ... and autumn clematis ...

june would be most of your typical annuals ...

and you have july all set ...

more hardcore deadheading might have extended the daisy bloom ... as you made it sound like you were almost afraid to do it too vigorously ... but they still peak for the most part .. leaving you a lot of summer ans fall with nothing else ...

good luck

ken

I appreciate the feedback Ken but you are a bit quick to the gun in your assumptions about me re my experience and the composition of garden in question.

This garden having the 6 compact Banana Cream Daisies also has Amsonia Blue Ice and Amsonia Arkansas Star as well as Russian Stonecrop.

I thought I had done my research last fall as most sites advertise this Daisy as blooming from early to late summer. In my books August is part of the summer.

But now that I know (for my area at least) that it is basically a July bloomer I will replaced two of these plants with a perennial August bloomer...maybe something in red and of similar height.

August in Nothern Europe is the most rich in flowers of them all. There are more plants blooming now, then June and July together. If you want shasta daisies in August try Manhattan. It blooms here from the end of July practically to the frost. It is up to 1,5 m tall, but selfsupporting and a lot of side branches. There are also two doubles: Stina and Fiona Coghill which are late blooming.

I'm in NH and you would think mine would bloom later than most, and later than Manhattan, but my Shastas are also spent now. They were pretty much a July flower this year. I don't know if our heat wave this July contributed to a shorter bloom season for the other Shastas because I haven't been gardening long enough to know. The Banana Creams actually have a very few blooms left and thus have outlasted the traditional Shasta daisies, but not by much.

deanna, your description fits mine except my Beckys are outlasting my Banana Creams (which are completely spent).

You have a good point about the heat being a factor except I thought it might have been offset by the abnormally wet and cool spring we had.

I was also thinking that it may be related to the age of my plants ie all are in their first full summer (having been planted last September).

I would like to add, that the runners on Leucanthemum 'Manhattan' are very short , so it actually looks like a clumper. Unlike Becky, which runs madly.

Just like Banana Cream is a compact clumper. Because of this one can actually use BC as a border plant if one desires...unlike for Becky which can easily soar to well over 4 feet!

"I thought I had done my research last fall as most sites advertise this Daisy as blooming from early to late summer."

I was given similar misinformation about "Snowcap" by a local nursery. I was told it would rebloom with deadheading and provide flowers throughout the summer. In reality, it finishes blooming by about the middle of July, has little or no rebloom, and rots terribly in my clay soil. I understand your frustration with Banana Cream.

Totally Confused

rouge21, my BC's are also new to the garden. Got it from the nursery last year, so this is their first year for me. My comment regarding heat comes from talking to a friend from Georgia who now summers on the Maine coast. She said she was amazed at how much longer blooms last on plants here, and she was comparing plants grown both in Georgia and Maine, not different varieties/species. She attributed it to the Georgia heat which stresses the blooms and shortens bloom time. I had never thought of it, but it sure does make sense. Heat stresses the plants and I could easily imagine it having a negative effect on delicate blooms. It will be something I'll be noting during future summers to see what happens in my garden.

UPDATE:

Now the second full growing season for this daisy and its poor performance was repeated ie

- this will be the final week of flowering and it seems again that there is no re-blooming even with conscientious aggressive dead heading
- short duration of bloom...much less than my Becky
- the spent flowers look very ratty

In my opinion this is a much over rated daisy.

rouge, how is your Banana Cream doing this year? Are you still of the mind that it's not worth it?

Funny you mention this today 'pam' as just this morning I shovel pruned the 4 remaining BC plants.

I removed every Shasta Daisy I planted a few years back. I love daisies but I didn't enjoy the habit of the plant. It was a short initial bloom and I was expecting that after I cut them back after that first bloom, they would produce another round of blooms, which they were very slow to do and then I only got a minor rebloom.

'prairie', I still have lots of 'Becky'. It will bloom for over 3 weeks and that is just fine for me (and I have never noticed any re-bloom after dead heading). But BC, as I have probably posted too many times was just yucky in every way.

This is all very interesting, thanks! I saw Banana Cream at two nurseries this year and was tempted. Pale yellow or vanilla is always a color I can use. IâÂÂm not really fond of the (plain) daisy form in general so have never bought any.

I did pick up a daisy last year for a song in the âÂÂneglected and unlabelledâ section of a local garden center. I knew from the leaves it was a daisy. It just started blooming last week. It turns out to be a plain white variety, about a foot to 18â tall. Nice enough, where I put it. But I wonâÂÂt expect much now for its bloom duration.

Thanks for sharing that Banana Cream is not worth the trouble.

As I recall esteemed GW member wieslaw59 has recommended the Leucanthemum "Broadway Lights".

(I don't recall seeing it in my nurseries.)

Here is a link that might be useful: BWL Daisy

OMG, I missed this thread the first two times around. Thanks so much to Pam for resurrecting it this year b/c when I saw Ken's post about Rouge being a newbie, I almost laughed myself to death! Thanks for the laugh this morning, I needed it. Rouge, your gardens are always an inspiration to me and so new, I don't know how you do it, LOL. Wow, the irony. Queue the tears of laughter...

LOL... that is funny, funnthsun!

What made me notice Banana Cream was my love for those little annual marguerite daisies which are pale yellow. I saw a picture of BC and thought it would be the answer. How disappointing that they're not all they're cracked up to be!!

Wow I do like the look of Broadway Lights too. I've never seen those in the nurseries here in Ontario either.

There's just something about daisies that makes one happy. Probably like a comfort food, for many of us, daisies were the first flowers we were made aware of, as children making daisy chains in the meadows. Fast forward to today where I see two ten-year olds in the park, talking to each other on their iPhones, lol.

Oh man, I can't believe how long some of us have been here. 11 years for me! No wonder my husband thinks I'm having an affair with someone called Pete Moss or Veronica Speedwell...

Thanks rouge21, I remember that the Shastas I had were started from seed and I think I had a 'Becky' but maybe they don't come true to seed.

Wow. I planted a bargain banÃÂ na cream last spring. It came back and has been in full bloom for about 3 weeks now. I guess I'm the odd man out because I have loved the show.