Pond Boss Forums AQUATIC VEGETATION Identifying plants Trying Tropical Lilies to Overwinter in Freezing

Some good info with the descriptions of lily plantings. Mine are starting to finally come around. Hope to get some in the pond soon. Need to get the old well up and running.
Good fish and wine stories. I can relate to the snotty winery staff. Probably the kids and nieces/nephews of the money.

AP, I kinda need to know what it is you are exactly trying to do? Give me a brief description of what you are trying to accomplish.

Burger, I think you had me read wrong at first. I am more humble and down to Earth then you could imagine. In fact, I can bet they were thinking, this dumb redneck is lost, he just fell off the turnup truck and missed the 7-11 at the last turnoff for his six pack. It don't bother me, I don't let it. I am just like Farmer Smurf, I swear and mumble under my breath, in my overalls, and if they don't like it, that is thier problem for being judgemental and uppity snooties.

There was even a customer half in the bag who was really a worse jerk then them. Brings his dog in, spills his wine, acts like an arrogant jerk and gives me these hard looks because how I am dressed. I could have just backhanded that look right off his face, but like I said, I just do my deal.

i saw water hyacinth in that photo...

I float a water hyacinth and a frogbit or two in my tanks as well. Great filtering plants. But only babies. And they never leave my tanks. I throw the bigger spent plants in the composter. Spent as in roots filled with crap. I also like parrotfeather but that stuff will root in your pots fast.

I am getting tropicals with 6-8 flowers already and no hardy's with more than one. I'll say it one more time, the tropicals I get are better performers, faster growers, better and earlier bloomers than the Hardys. Plus colors not available. That is just a fact. I am not going to great lengths to build up my inventory for no reason. I just don't have enough seasons with them to judge thier collective overwintering in my climate. So I am not comfortable delivering them en masse to my customers. The ratios are and will be low for now until I get adequate product testing. I'm getting there.

Same with my droughtbuster strains and deep depth growers. One season could be a fluke. 3 to 4 seasons is a proof over time test. I am adding new strains there as well, and marketing more proven strains. In my area I am the lone ranger there.

I would just like to experiment with 3 or 4 lilies and see if any survive our winter. Maybe putting them in 4ft. of water will do the trick but I don't have access to much variety around here, mostly at Lowes or Home Depot.
My wife would like to see more color on the pond and even though she has a green thumb with garden flowers she's not familiar with water plants.

The stores or chains like Home Depot or Lowes sell very inexpensive lilies, some in a box. You ever hear, you get what you pay for. They are junk. In order to get satisfactory results you need quality stock. Rootstock in this case, even rhizomes. In your climate you would be best served trying 4 Hardies known for cold weather and maybe 1 tropical. And for each species there is a known optimum band for planting depth, not just all at four feet. Some species do a little bit better deeper than others. Also, they tend to grow towards that zone. Too deep, they start migrating up. Too shallow, they start going deep. The plants themselves know better than anyone else where they want to be and try to get there.

Sounds like a good plan. Too bad I don't do mail order or I would hook you up. In your case I would look locally for an aquatic nursery. If they have a website run it by me, I'll look it over for you. If not you should go mail order. Be prepared for sticker shock on single plant retail plus priority shipping. Then you realistically should get bareroot and start them in containers in your pond water, maybe even in your pond, but maybe with better soil or amended pond bottom. Let me know your available options and I may be able to get you some breaks or help.

I'll start checking around for garden centers that have water plants, there use to be one in Saratoga Springs.

Maybe http://www.thepondpeople.net

I'll have to check them out, They're only 30 minutes from my daughters place.

Sounds like a plan, very interested in what they offer in your neck of the woods as far as species, prices and advice. Fact finding missions are fun.

This late spring rains, worst since 2003 according to one of my rice grower customers are hurting me, in multiple ways. Backing up jobs for one, but even worse I can't get to any decent pond bottom soil. My key beaver pond is flooded, and all back ups as well. I need to replenish my stock tubs as I sold quite a few of my largest plants already and need to get going on replacements. I made the mistake of taking recent weather patterns as constant and normal, where I could go out in May and start getting new soil to blend.

Live and learn. This year I am going to stock up heavy, and have two seasons worth. Of all dumb things to slow down production, actually grind it to a halt. I have part two of the photo series when I bring the beaver pond bottom chunks home and blend it. I will try to post them in the new photo area today.

Pond Frog, I did get to that water garden place you mentioned and the lilies were all hardy species, no tropicals, I can see why you grow your own the cheapest ones were 19 bucks.
Needless to say I decided that I didn't want to put out that kind of money right now so I will stick to putting different plants on my floating islands.
Thanks for the info, I would like to try some in the future.

Yes, they retail way up there. The cheapest ones at a place I wholesale with retail for $24.95. I am expanding as fast as I can. I wish you were closer as I could get you a break. You probably should have bought all that lady was selling with that very nice filter. I am also beginning to farm them out in ponds I manage. I almost have unlimited amount of my Frog's Droughtbuster special. They are flowering big time and have leaves over 12" across. The tropicals are just a experiment, but I am rolling many new kinds into production this season. Especially Reds, Yellows, Peach and another White. It's a bit of work, but they sure sell well.

This project is going badly. Operation tropical lilies picked a very bad year to start. I took rootstock with 3 to 5 flowers per rhizome and potted them up and put them in cold water. Talk about transplant shock! All the leaves tunred yellow and since died. The new growth is sluggish at best. Not one new flower out of 20+ plants. Even my previous tropicals are just hating these cold temps and wild flucuations. Tons of rains, cold rain can't be helping.

I might just swap tanks around and get these in my hottest best hours of sunlight tank and give them another season to acclimate. I think I am at the mercy of our weather patterns and should go with developing new colors and strains of drought resistant strains. I'm still at crest or just below many of my ponds, in fact all of them. In previous seasons I'd be down 2-3 feet by now. I'd have to speculate many of my fire ponds are not going dry, and I am not going to lose 9 feet or more of water this season. Just a hunch. So I can plant many, many different rhizomes at low water this season and easily be able to get them back out next year. We went from having back to back to back serious droughts to incredible low temps and maybe 150% of normal rainfall. Did not see this coming.

I have a 13+ workday run coming up anyway so I just have to dedicate a few hours here and there to convert things over and put operation tropical on hold.

I'd have to agree with you there. Our pond is at the highest level I've ever seen it and the spillway is still running like mad.

Always on the move, especially reacting to the current market. Minis are really selling, so are Red Hardies. And the demand for droughtbuster lilies is neverending. I do have a great potential source for new droughtbuster strains and colors near JHAP's place. I am keeping my fingers crossed there and hope the lady will wheel and deal.

I'm set for minis and the rest I want like changables are getting sold out. As are the reds.

So I am filling the holes in my new every tank has a color set up. Two more Reds and three more Peaches. The Reds will be Attraction and Rembrant. I want Black Princess and some French named one but I cannot pay $20 bucks a plant. The Peaches are my good ol stanby Colorado, Peaches and Cream and my new favorite Peach Munkala Ubon. Of course my favorite water lily guy Dusty at Texas Water Lilies is taking care of me as always.

So now I will have a Tropical tank, a Mini Tank, a Red, Peach, White, Pink and Yellow tank. The types with a little bit of white but another primary color will go in that colors tank. And I will keep working on droughtbusters. My deep water experiment really went well, especially with the abundant rain this season. I have some excelling at 8-9 feet deep, where many said they would not work. They are. Off to mow and tint for the day.

Have to start or pot close to 100 lilies the next couple of days. Trying a new soil blend this season, one part clay/snad canal bottom, 1 part old beaver pond black bottom, well rotted. Touch of fish emulsion 5-1-1. Beavers look to be gone after being there my entire life. They made this weird diversion, cistern looking thing upstream and there was a fire. But the last den within several miles of creek is abandoned. Went to scout it out, pick some wild blackberries and grab the black bottom mud.

Water is at all time low, lots of turtles stuck in puddle in middle of parrotfeather surface. I'm getting them out sooner than later. Even bullfrogs are lost, stuck high and dry, dead polliwogs in dried out cracked depressions.

Got 14 5 gal buckets full, rolled a dolly down with two milk crates. Filled them up and back for more. In 100 degree heat midafternoon there was more water in my t shirt and skivvies than in the creek. In the 4 inch cracks between the chunks there is fresh soft muck. I leave that and took only slices of the black bottom.

Blend that wet with red clay sand mix, stinky fish emulsion. Going with 3 whites, 3 reds, 3 peaches. Going for 7th 300 gal stock tank. Should have over 200 plants at home, nearly double that at ponds I manage. Trying to expand droughtbuster series with more colors. Might also start some pond smartweed with pink flowers. Have a new customer with a lot of it. Looks like great fish cover, and pond entry plant to go with lilies. Almost maxed out on tub space, 7 300's, 3 100's. My goal is 10 300's, but they might not fit, and wife is having a fit. But I need to get a head start for Fall planting at low water. If I have 2-3 months of growth in pots my overwinter success rate vastly improves.

New customer where I planted 10 doubles and triangles of 11 species doing great. The only dud was weak stock with little leaves. Also did 10 different marginals, they all survived. Mixed in some bulbs, daylilies and dahlias. Have to replant a few of those and drop off some baby bullfrogs I grew from polliwogs in the lily tanks along with gambusia. Each tank produces lilies, either gambusia of FHM and bullfrog polliwogs. Taking photos of course.

Great report, PF. I got a little uncomfortable at the part where you were talking about your skivvies and then fresh chunks of black muck, but I caught on quickly!

I'd love to see some pics of not only the plantings in client ponds that you mentioned in the post, but also of your grow out setup at home. I'm sure others would, as well.

I was ringing wet from sweat, just humpin those 5 gallon buckets out two at a time in that heat and lack of air movement was brutal. But I am under the gun as I have lots of bareroots arriving by priority mail soon. And they don't handle the heat at all bareroot.

I always photo document and journal all of my work. Just have to figure out how to shrink photos for forum thread or pester Omaha. But have to roll as not getting much done posting. Figure about 14-16 hours of work. Also got new free source of variegated giant reed for free. Pretty cool plant, gets tall, nice looking, but easy to control and maintain. That was a good deal. Just have to place plants in water til they root.

Looking forward to the pics. And if I'm not mistaken, you don't actually have to resize them now as the forum software may do it automatically. Another option is to use the "File Manager" function that appears right below your response box. That just lets you find the pic on your computer and attach it, then it shows up as a link in your message and viewers just click on it and see the pic in a new window. No uploading to a hosting site, no resizing issues, nada. It's the easiest way to do it, I think.

Understood about getting to work. I probably ought to do a little bit of the same! Have a good one, PF!

Arghhh!!! Thought I had photos attached...