Lily Lovers Look here!

Yep, deer. 18 of 'em give or take a few are in the herd this spring. plus rabbits, and then this year for the first time ever, squirrels are replacing our lily and tulip bulbs with the neighbors walnuts. Bushels of walnuts are buried in the new raised lily bed that we put in last October. But I'm not complaining, it could be worse.

my new discovery today was my beautiful hostas were eaten. i believe it was a vole. i complained about the mole. at least he only at grubs and worms. oh my poor hostas. well there are some left in another garden bed. i hope it doesn't venture there. the dang nabbit thang!!!!
the good news is that our weather was so unseasonably warm the past 2 days, that my trumpets that had just broken the ground yesterday, ranged from 2-7" tall and the martagons tat never came up last year, 2 are up and looking goooooooood.
debi z

Isn't it thrilling when they don't come up one year and you think you lost them and then they show up the next year? I had that happen with one of my orientals. Three grew, but one was small. The next year I had only 2 and the 3rd year I had 3 again. It is smaller than the other 2 but I'm not complaining!! :)

oh iowaron, i am so sorry to hear that about ur lilies!!! ): i have lost two pretty big clumps of panseys this year to a gopher... he sucked the whole thing down his dang hole!!!! when i went to set the traps , i found pieces of the panseys.. i LOVED those panseys!!!! they are the light purple with yellow.. well here is a pic.. these started out so small when i planted them .. i planted them in jan (i think!) and last week , two of them GONE.. sigh so i am moving them anyway from one bed to a new one... and i will put the wire cages around the bottoms... these happen to be my fav. panseys!!!! sorry to hear about the deer!!!
chrissy

boy, that sure is the pits, Ron. We're on the edge of town but the deer very seldom venture this far. They stay closer to the Big Sioux. We're only 5 miles from the SD border and there's lots of trees and hills the last 2 mi. so you have to be watching while driving thru there. I've seen flocks of wild turkeys on the highway, too. Wouldn't wanna hit one of them either! Have you ever tried the sensors that when tripped start a radio or lights? Someone mentioned it I think on the pests forum and I wondered if it would work. Might be worth a try!!

Oh Chrissy, what a beautiful bunch of pansies! Thanks for sharing your story and picture-misery loves company. :-)
Ahh but Spring has finally arrived in Central Iowa, and it'll take a lot more than marauding deer to get me down. Did I mention that last Sunday night they tore down the electric fence to get to the lilies? I think I'll try Kooger's suggestion and invest in some motion detection devices.
Iowaron

thanx iowaron, i love these pansies... stupid gophers!!!!! i never did catch that one who ate them.. although i saw one near the garden , dead, my cats caught it... hopefully that was the one eating my pansies... i had six of them and am now down to four.. i HAVE to move them so i dont come out one morning and find another one gone.. gophers ate one two of my delphiums (sp?) too... argggghh!!! stupid gophers!!! anyway i wantedto share my lilies..(sorry ron) this is the first year i have had lilies of any kind... so i am very excited... they havent bloomed yet but will soon.. lilyfan it didnt seem very long ago i was posting here all excited about me planting them... (: i think this is a pink tiger lily... i am so excited!!!!
chrissy

this is one of my raised picket fence lily beds.. (: grow lilies grow.....(=

here is a nice on that I got seeds for from england

Oh chrissy, I'm so jealous! My lilies are up and looking great, but none have buds. I guess I'll just have to wait patiently for your flowers and my buds! That little bed is looking really good.

ziekertail, gorgeous! Does it have a name?

Silk Road update, It has the main stalk and at least 2 babies!

Ron, I'm glad you are able to stay positive about this whole thing. If it was me I would have pulled out all my hair, cryed myself blind, screamed myself hoarse, and then sat up with the shotgun!

Oh, that sucks. Sometimes I'm so glad I live in an as of yet 'undiscovered' deer area. Once they find me out though, I'll be toast.

I was wondering how long it takes for lilies to settle in and be happy? I planted a mixed bag from White Flower Farms fall before last. They came up last year, but were shorter than expected and just one stalk and kind of sad. They are all (except the orientals) breaking ground now and look strong and I'm suprised to see a lot of baby leaves around. I would think they would have to be in the ground a few years and grow a lot before making babies! How long til the babies make flowers?

eco,
i'm not sure on the babies, but i've read 3 years before blooms. of course i'm sure it depends on were they are planted and which one it is too. some are far quicker than others. last year i did some moving around of asiatics that were 3 years old. there were bulbettes in there ranging from 1/8" to 8 cm. so much fun.
good luck and enjoy your blooms & dreams
debi z

llilyfan, would you be interested in starting a second thread? This one has gotton so long, it takes a long time to get it on my computer.

llilyfan the name is Lilium duchartrei is a lily introduced from Western China in about 1903 by the plant hunter Reginald Farrer. It has white recurved 'turk's-cap' flowers and grows to about 2-3 feet and here is a picture of another lilium its called martagon lily

CICI77, my heart goes out to you and your pansies (viola's). i just put down about 5 seed packets in my woodlands garden. hopefully some of them will take. they are just so pretty and dainty. i'm just like you with my lilies and they arn't my first. last year i ran a co-op and i must have purchased at least 100 lilium. welllllllll some didn't come up, some only came up a bit and others blossomed. this year i'm looking forward to seeing a much better display. :) and then there are the babies :)
then when h.d.'s lilies blooms die they mark them down to $1.50 - $2.00 a pot of 3. so i'm there buying them and planting them to my garden. so i can now look forward to them this spring.
oh yes and bert at http://www.eflowergarden.com/ has some i just had to purchase. his prices are soooooo good. they are sitting on my table ready to go in as soon as the rain stops here. i'm going to try potting some this year.

i think my blasted vole ate some of my lily bulbs too! arrrrgh!

Iowaron, i can't believe they went through the electric fence. they must be starved to do that to themselves. have you thought of planting things on the other side of the fence for them. grasses or something that grows really quickly. just a thought. but then i guess that would attract them and they would want to come over anyways and get your lilies. harrumph. have you tried hair? i heard human hair is a big deterrant.

ziekertail, those are all called "species" lilies, right? the lily garden http://www.thelilygarden.com/pages_lilies/seeds.html has seeds for sale, species, trumpets and others. they are so pretty with there dangling little flowers. my tainufoliums, planted last spring, i had only a couple of blooms, from about 8 plants. but i've big hopes for them this year. they have broken ground and looking good. :) naturepatch sent me some bulbills, can't remember the name right now, but the little devils are growing and some were only tossed on top of the earth. they survived our -30 to -60F weather!!!! strong little things.
well i've gone on here. later............
i just loooooooooooooove talking lilies.
debi z
pic: some stargazers in part sun

HI Debi_Z, Your Stargazers look like they love where you planted 'em. They are blooming so nice.

Yes, we've tried the human hair and coyote urine and even had a brief fling with egg water spray. Each works until the deer come to visit, then they quit working. We've chopped up bars of Irish Spring soap, planted daffodils, and finally put up an electric fence to try to detour the deer.

I like to think our deer are kinda Special Deer. I imagine them all standing around the electric fence looking over at the lilies and one saying to the other "You touch it"-"No. You touch it". "I touched it last time". And of course this conversation goes on around the circle until the most brain damaged amongst them gets fed up and hollers "All Right!, I'll do it, Again!, now just back off and let me have a run at this thing".
Naturally our electric fence is on a ground fault protector system, so the instant the contact is made, the power is shut off and must be manually reset. (a safety feature) so one guy gets a "tingle", and the rest of the herd is home free.

However, there is good news. Llilyfan has told me of a product that,according to the power of advertising, seems like will be the answer to my prayers. It's a spray on product named "Plantskydd". I'm anxious to use it but it's been threatening rain so often I'll hold off till after the weekend. www.plantskydd.com
Iowaron
PS: If you have had experience with Plantskydd and it really works, please tell me. If it don't work, Please at least give me at least a week to hope. :-)
Ron

iowaron,
sounds good. i hope it works well for you. i'll say a little prayer that during there conversation outside your fence that they all say. "hell no i'm not goin' in there, somethin' is lurking and waiting to kill me, i'm outa here." turns and runs away.

they say the active ingredient is bloodmeal. i'm wondering if some bloodmeal outside your fenceline might help too.

i hope to hear glowing reports here soon.
debi z

Oh debi_z, Thanks for the prayer and "deer conversation".LOL I needed that laugh-out-loud this morning. It rained here all day yesterday, but I'll let you know about the PlantSkydd and how effective it is with our knuckle-headed deer.
I hope bloodmeal don't attract carnivores?
Iowaron

ron, maybe you should put up a sign. "Wanted: Venison Stew" make it with that bright orange color hunters use. maybe they need a visual stimulant. ;-) snicker snicker
debi z

lilyfan started a new thread for this.
http://davesgarden.com/t/427318/