Indoor Gardening and Houseplants: Water growen Amaryllis, 1 by kdjoergensen

kdjoergensen wrote:
Kim,
amaryllis can be grown in water. When you buy it, it will have all it needs to bloom (inside the bulb) and provided it does not topple over (it does that sometimes) you can get it to grow and flower in the vase.

I must disappoint you however, with the 4xyear blooming. No amaryllis does this. Some very large amaryllis plants may put out 2, or even 3 flower stems, but the ones at walmart usually put out one (1) only, but it does unfold 4 flowers ??!!!! If it is going to put out more flower stems it will do so within weeks of the first one. Do not put in fridge.

However, once it is done blooming, and you cut off the flower stem, the water contain no nutrition for the plant. Leaving it in water will not help the bulb. You would have to add liquid plant food to the water on a weekly or fortnightly basis (these amaryllis plants are very heavy feeders and should be fertilized at the "strong" recommendation on the bottle).

I would probably take the step and plant the bulb in a "flower pot" at this time, because caring for it is easier and fertilizing can be done by adding a 3 months slow release fertilizer such as OSMOCOTE (and no water changes, right ??)

For the plant to rebloom, you do not need to cool it. But it needs a 8-10 month growing period during which it will grow into a thicker bulb. What it needs now is LOTS of sun, water, and fertilizer. If you can, transplant it to the garden in full sun after last chance of frost (when it safe to put annuals outdoors) and fertilize it frequently. It should send up new growth (for every 3-4 leaves produced, a new flower stem will be initiated inside the plant).

Just one note: it takes 18 months from formation of a flower stem until flowering. Therefore, the flower stem you will see next year, has already been formed and is inside the bulb eventhough it just flowered. The flower stem which will form this spring as new leaves are produced, you will not see until 18 months from now.

To make the plant rebloom, dig the bulb up from the ground in september/october (before first frost) and put it in a dry cool spot (garage, basement) for the leaves to die back. This may take 4-5 weeks. Then you can cut the dead, withered leaves off at the nose of the bulb. Place the bulb in a dry and not too hot space (e.g. basement, or regular room. not a garage which can freeze, but don't put it on top of the fireplace either). In 3-4 month, a new flower stem will appear at the nose of the bulb (or leaves will, it depends a bit on the cultivar). At this time you can restart the bulb in soil (or water) and it should flower 6-8 weeks later.

Amaryllis will flower once per year. It can be made to reflower but need plenty of fertilizer, water and sunshine and must grow in circumference inorder to have enough "juice" to bloom.

Contrary to common belief, amaryllis does not need a cool period to rebloom. You dont even have to "rest it" .. you can continue to grow it as a houseplant and it will eventually bloom if you just make sure it gets sun, water, and fertilizer. However, if you grow it 8-10 months you can "program" it to flower at a specific time by giving it a rest and then restart it in which case it will bloom 4-6 weeks later. This way you can rebloom it for someones special day, etc.


I hope this helped you.

Here is a picture of my amaryllis when I harvested it from the garden this fall (October 1st):