This surefire perennial is a must for the Southern garden. Here are some tips to help you use daylilies well.

• Permanent fixture: Evergreen selections claim their spots in the garden year-round, so plant them in generous sweeps where their foliage adds texture to the border.
• Here today, gone tomorrow: Semievergreen selections may or may not keep their leaves, depending on where they are grown. Like their deciduous counterparts, they should be planted where the foliage from other plants (such as liriope) will fill in the voids when leaves disappear.
• Long and short of it: Heights range from 1 to 4 feet. While the shorties do well as front-of-the-border plants, tall guys such as ‘Hyperion’ are better in the back.
• Timing is everything: With early, mid-, and late-season bloomers, you can have flowers filling your garden from May through frost. For easy nonstop color, plant one of the repeat bloomers such as ‘Happy Returns.’

"Family of Flowers" is from the May 2008 issue of Southern Living.