1999 Livermore Show Results

Below are the results of 1999 Livermore Show held on March 6th & 7th hosted by Alden Lane Nursery. 

The beautiful banner at Alden Lane announcing our show!

Show results information are presented in the following format:

1. the identification of the award;

2. the name of the cultivar(s) and possibly the division (a number from 1 thru 13) followed by the color of the petals, a dash, and the color of the cup;

3. and the name of the exhibitor.
   

Some of the daffodils have multiple colored petals and cups, so you will see more than one color identified between the dashes. For more information about the classification of daffodils see Classification Definitions.

Show Statistics:

Horticulture: Number of Exhibits: 195
Number of Exhibitors: 23
Number of Blooms: 580

Artistic Arrangements: Number of Exhibits: 19
Number of Exhibitors: 13

GOLD RIBBON - Casterbridge 2YYW-O,  Kirby Fong

WHITE RIBBON - Rapture 6Y-Y, Wayne Steele

MINI GOLD RIBBON- Hummingbird 6Y-Y, Bob Spotts

MINI WHITE RIBBON - Hummingbird 6Y-Y, Bob Spotts

ROSE RIBBON: Seedling # D439 2Y-O, Ben Hager

MINI ROSE RIBBON: not awarded

JUNIOR AWARD - Patsy 2W-P (Spotts unreg.), Megan McQueen

Intermediate Award -  Brooke Ager 2W-P, Wayne Steele

SMALL GROWER AWARD - Miss Prim 2Y-Y, Jan Moyers

Historic Daffodil Award - Minicycla 6Y-Y 1913, Kirby Fong

Standard Container Grown Award - Sportsman 2Y-R, Kirby Fong

Miniature Container Grown Award -  Quince 12Y-Y, Dian Keesee

Species Container Grown Award - N. jacetanus 13Y-Y, Kirby Fong

SILVER RIBBON (for most blue ribbons) - Kirby Fong with 42 blues

Comments by Show Chairman, Kirby Fong

The Northern California Daffodil Society just had its first show of the season in Livermore (in the San Francisco bay area). The show was a week earlier than normal.  In my town, the season is later than normal, although this is not true for the entire region.

I had refrigerated a lot of bulbs last fall to get them to bloom earlier, and it worked. We have had a longer and colder winter than average, and this appears to have helped the red and orange cup daffodils as they had a deeper, more luminous color than usual. The cups on my Conestoga were almost entirely orange, and Bandit looked like its color code this year.

Ben Hager who lives in Stockton in the San Joaquin Valley has been breeding red and orange cup daffodils for years.  Indeed, we have an award named in his honor for a collection of five red or orange cup standard daffodils with yellow perianths.

Because Ben is ill, Bob Spotts picked and Stan Baird staged some of
Ben's seedlings.  They were truly outstanding. Ben won the Ben Hager
award, and one of his seedlings not only won the Rose ribbon but was also selected as the best American bred daffodil and reserve champion bloom for the show.

The show was held in a tent specially provided by Alden Lane Nursery at the nursery. The nursery also put a big banner atop their building to advertise the daffodil show.  Between the nursery and our publicity chairman, we got the word out and drew more people to the nursery than would otherwise have been there.   I'm glad to say this has been beneficial to our show as well as to the nursery.

I should also add that the local garden club was active in organizing artistic design classes. They had an accredited judge give them a workshop on arranging with daffodils the day before the show, and Sid DuBose graciously donated 30 dozen daffodils for their use. This allowed them to do designs with a lot of red cup and pink daffodils, not just yellow ones.
Below is the preliminary report of the show. Color codes have not been verified against the Data Bank.

Comments from visiting judge Bob Darling, Washington DC

The Northern California Daffodil Society began the season in lovely style in Livermore. It has been years since I last saw Livermore - surrounded by those lovely gently greening hills that defines a California valley springtime. I'd only a few blooms to contribute, but they provided infinite pleasure, zen
moments, coaxing them to be "perfect" to show. A prelude to others that
follow.

The Northern California show uses Redwood sprigs for wedging the stems.  Being initiated into daffodil showing by the boxwood regimes of the east coast, the Redwood seemed less odd this time around. The first time I tried  using it several years back, I wondered what to do with such flamboyant foliage. However, my shears whacked it into shape and the effect worked quite well.

The show filled a small tent set-up in a lovely nursery that seemed to have
staged mini gardens along the path to the show. Azaleas, Camellias and a very tempting display of tree peonies (with photo blooms) enticed. Daffodils however, were the order of the day. Despite worries about the early season, blooms filled many categories and the display tables were well furnished.

My own efforts included a vase of three miniature "Wee Bees" that obliged by blooming through a brief snow before I left Washington. Also a surprise in Oakland were the amount of bloom from a healthy stand of Jetfire that provided another vase of three. Vases of three make a show look full in my mind even when they are as small as the "Wee Bee"s!

Leaping to attention were the numerous seedlings contributed by the California growers.   Division Two and Three both were subdivided to include seedlings in separate classes.  Of special note, a div. 3O-ORR (?) by Ben Hager with an astounding round ROUND perianth brushed and burnished and glistening with color.  Stan Baird pointed Ben's blooms out to me. Unfortunately, I had to leave before the Judging was complete and there were others in Ben's series including a striking div 2.  How pleased I was that Bob Spotts featured a wonderful peach triandrus.  But Bob laments that he has difficulty growing on his division 5's. Alas!

The California show also includes potted bulbs and many growers resort to pots to keep their collections going in the sometime recalcitrant daffodil climate.  These also held surprises including a lovely pot of "Snipe" and a small pot of "Minicycla."

Bob Spotts, with some chagrin also noted the beautiful pots contributed by the Girl Scouts, of seedling bulbs he had culled and now wonders about. Hummm. .. One, albeit with a weak perianth, had the most glorious deep rose pink-lavender cup. Bob had "named" these various clones Eileen and other girls names so that they could be distinguished, but did not force the girls to use a list of numbers in order to show them. A good idea in this instance.

While I don't know the particulars, I'm certain Kirby, Bob and others will
inform the net of special ribbon winners.  What a lovely way to begin the
season!  What a pleasure to be in Livermore and celebrate daffodils with
California friends.  My time proved too short and alas, I'd over programmed
myself and needed to live and drive across the bay for another adventure.

Well the blooms begin. Have a great season everyone.

Photos by Nancy Tackett