Alaska Shasta Daisy

Shasta Daisy
Leucanthemum x superbum 'Alaska'
(lew-KANTH-ih-mum) (soo-PER-bum)

This is one of the oldest Shasta Daisy cultivars and it is still around so that says something about it. There has been a couple out in the garden for long time so it is truly perennial for us. The flowers are up to 4 inches across and make a good cut flower. My only problem with ‘Alaska’ is that it does get quite tall (30 inches) and can be prone to flopping. I have always wanted to try pinching it early in the season to reduce the height but always forget. Maybe next year. It is a self-seeder and the seedlings are easy to transplant. It can succeed in hot and dry soils so it can be a bit of a problem solver. If you remember to dead head the first flush of spent flowers it will often bloom again later.


Sometimes I think this site should be called Daisy flower pictures.com instead of Digital flower pictures. There have been a lot of Daisies posted here. I find it to be a very photogenic group of flowers. Technically it is an easy flower to shoot as the blooms are held relatively upright and the flower itself is flat. That means it doesn’t require a lot of thought about the depth of field. The white color seems to make getting the right exposure easier, too.