Water Gardening: Lotus are blooming!!!, 1 by darlindeb

darlindeb wrote:
Well, because I don't like dividing lotus (it's a dirty job). I usually just put one tuber in the center of the pot. Because I don't like chasing after tubers, I put a rock on my tuber laying on top of the soil with the growing point up. I just use regular garden soil or I have used bags of top soil. I did recently purchase a bag marked top soil from Wal-Mart and it had the little white things in the soil that float on the top of the water. The only reason I buy bagged soil is when I have to work at the school pond and it's just easier for me to haul a bag into the courtyard. Anyway, you DO NOT WANT THE LITTLE WHITE THINGS (Pearlite??) they float and make a mess and will clog pumps. NEVER BUY any bags marked POTTING SOIL TO USE IN THE POND because of the evil white floatie things.

Now having said that when I first started playing with lotus. I grew them in patio ponds. I think you can still find these at 'Home Depot' for about $30 or $40 bucks. I probably put 10 lotus in each patio pond. It was a very hot summer and I always made sure the plants had 4 or 5 inches of water above them. They did fantastic. I fertilized them with the only thing I new which was fruit tree spikes. I fertilized them every month. I talked them. I was amazed by those. Another weird thing I did was I put a couple of inches of white rock in the bottom of each patio pond. I have no idea why I did this or if it made any difference. I guess I was just used to putting drainage in other pots. This made the patio ponds alot heavier to deal with so I didn't do that in the future.

I still have those patio ponds and they get used for all kinds of things. Plant storage, starting baby plants, too lazy or tired to deal with some water plant at the moment. And my puppy dog has taken one over in the front as his personal swimming pool. You can also empty them out and put ice in them to hold loads of canned drinks. I have gotten my money out of those patio pools and they have held up.

Okay, back to dividing lotus. I think what I have here is a "mother" tuber. When you go to divide you will probably find some soft dead tubers. I was told this is normal. It's just the old generation passing on. There is also a "smell" that I can only describe as primordial.
Okay, it stinks. I also don't know how lotus turn regular garden soil into something like clay but that seems to be my observation. I toss the "mothers" and any broken tubers and excess runners. I gotta go play with my puppy dog. I'll try to send more photos tomorrow. Also, my way is not the only way.