Help on planting water lily

I acquired two water lilies from an inlet in a local river late yesterday and need to know how I should plant them. I rinsed all the mud off and put each in a separate plastic tub with fresh water. I've only had a pond/water garden for about 6 weeks, so I'm not too up on what I need to do.

One lily has a huge, vertical rhizome that is about a foot long and 8" around. Can I trim this rhizome to a more manageable size for planting? If so, can I plant the portion of the rhizome that I cut off? And, if I find that I've got too many lilies for my pond, can I pot them and grow them in plastic tubs for a long period?

I will appreciate any help and advice.

Mardell, here are some basic guidelines - I'm assuming these are hardy water lilies, so if they're tropical, please post a followup so someone familiar with those can correct my instructions:

Can you trim them? Yes, lilies are "trimm-able", and you can plant the pieces you trim off.

You'll need plastic pots that are as wide or wider than they are deep (kinda rules out the typical one gallon pots we buy perennials in, but pond plant pots aren't very expensive at Home Depot and places like that.) Make sure your pot has at least one hole on the bottom if you don't use the "mesh" type pots.

To plant, use heavy garden soil, preferably clay; don't use any "sterile potting mixture" as it's too light and will float out of the pot.

1. Sprinkle a small layer of coarse, well-washed gravel or rock in the bottom of the pot;

2. Fill to within 2" of the top with soil;

3. Add one or two pond plant fertilizer tablets (or break a tree fertilizer "stake" into thumbnail size pieces and stick a couple of them in the dirt;

4. Set your rhizome on top, tucking the roots into the soil;

5. Add more soil if you need to cover the roots, but don't cover the rhizome itself - it should be just about level with the top of the pot.

6. Now add a layer of pea gravel (rinsed) on top, to hold the soil in place.

7. Water thoroughly. If you have a plastic tub or other watertight container large enough to hold the pot, fill it with water and place the pot in the water, this will remove any air holes and get the dirt saturated and settled before you place the pot in your pond, and minimize the amount of sediment that leaches into your pond water.

8. Once it's thoroughly soaked, and no air bubbles are rising from the immersed plant, set it in your pond. If you still have leaves on the plant, try to position it at its "natural depth", meaning the stems run nearly vertical to the top of the water, and they don't have to spread too far horizontally for the leaves to float on the water's surface.

Place away from any waterfalls or fountains that cause a lot of surface disturbance, as lilies prefer calm water. Most lilies also need full sun or at least several hours of daylight to bloom well.

You'll need to fertilize your plant about once a month during the growing season, taper off as the days and water temps start to cool down.

Here's a link to a free monthly newsletter on ponding - you may find some of the archived articles helpful. (I sure did when I first started ponding last year, and I still learn something new each month.) http://watergarden.com/index.php?i=6home

Welcome to Dave's Garden, by the way!

Hi Mardell and welcome to Dave's Garden! You will love it here.

Congrats on becoming a ponder! From your description, your lily is a hardy. I could explain to you how to divide and pot a lily, but this link http://www.theplantplace.com/toc.htm (where I learned) has excellent directions along with pictures of each step.

And yes, they should do fine in plastic tubs. Lots of people, including myself, use whisky barrels (with liners and little pumps) as patio ponds. Since the ponds freeze over here some winters, I put all the whisky barrel plants into the bottom of my big pond for the winter. Hope this is of some help to you.

Jean

Thank you go_vols and jjsgarden...I got my water lillies planted in planters and put into a metal stock tank last night. I did break the big one up into 3 smaller ones, but that left another mid-sized one with a lot of new growth on it and a really small one that must have broken off one of the other two plants. So far, so good! I want to give them a good start before putting them into my pond.

Again, thanks for your help and advice!

I can't add anything to advice you have received. It's what we do also. The only thing different I do is line the pots which I purchase from That Pet Place, with quilt batting. The clay works perfect but this year someone told me to use kitty litter (unscented) which I put into the quilt batting and the lilies are blooming beautifully. Submerge it deep enough so that the leaves float and don't bunch up. Good Luck!!!!!