Big Daddy Hosta
Big Daddy Hosta is a large blue hosta that has large white flowers, is slug resistant, and grows in deep shade. Learn how to grow this zone 4 perennial.
Big Daddy is probably one of the best large Blue Hostas in the industry. It was registered by Paul Aden in 1978. It has a rich blue-green color with thick corrugated leaves that are cupped and puckered at maturity.
It won the best blue Leaf Award at the AHS Convention in 1989.
A Large Hosta with Beautiful Flowers
It flowers in mid July with white flowers on 30 inch scapes. It becomes a very large mound of 25″ to 30″ high by 60″ wide of a heavily corrugated mass of large leaves after about 5 years. Anyone that sees it in my bed is impressed with its size. Mine is in deep shade and loves it there.
Slug Resistant
The image directly above was taken in mid-September and I find no slug holes on the leaves! It is a tough older Hosta that I had passed on purchasing for many years.
Big Daddy hosta is very slug resistant. Slugs don’t like it. I have Royal Standard next to it and every year they are eaten with gusto, but Big Daddy has no damage from slugs. (I put up with Royal Standard being a favorite of slugs because of the large white lily like blooms in August).
Big Daddy Hosta Is A Good Choice for Deep Shade
It takes a year or two to get established as all Hostas do, but it grows by leaps and bounds after that. Even in the deep shade under tall pine trees. I have been impressed with how fast it grew once it got to be 3 years old.
You need to give it a lot of space to accommodate the large heavy leaves. It will overtake smaller plants. It will also crowd out any weeds and vegetation that tries to grow under it.
It would be a great grouping or wave planting and also as a focal point with golden leaf hostas or variegated hostas mixed in.
Big Daddy hosta has become a favorite of many gardeners as the large mound of foliage makes for an impressive cupped leaf specimen. I wish now I hadn’t waited so long to buy it!
Related types of large Hostas are Big Mama, Geneva Remembrance, Lakeside Masterpiece, and Tucker Pucker. (From the Hosta Handbook by Mark Zilis.)
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Have you tried broken eggshells to keep the slugs at bay? They seem to work for me!
Hello Karen,
I have not tried the broken egg shells on my Hostas. I have heard of using them but never got enough collected I guess! I don’t have a major problem with them since I started using chopped up leaves and pine needles that I bag up in the in the fall and put on the beds. Seems slugs have no interest in these as they don’t create a nice moist area like wood chips do. Thank you for checking out my site! Judi
I am looking for a source for a big daddy hosta; between home and camp I have over 100 hosted but have not had good luck with ordering. Do you have a reliable source that you would recommend? Thanks!
Hi Judie,
I am sorry I didn’t see your post before now! This one didn’t come into my e-mail to tell me.
In reply to your question……I don’t know where you are located, but here in Wisconsin, I order from Uniquely Hostas, Land of the Giants, (I think they are not doing mail order right now, but have a nice website and you can go there to purchase if you live close) and also order from Northern Grown Perennials, and if you just type in Hosta for sale, in which ever state you live in, you should be able to find a couple of good sites. Check out on Facebook also, a Hosta Growers page. Thanks for asking, hope I have been some help. Have fun gardening! Judi