Help- question regarding oriental lily bulbs planted in fall

Hi all - I'm brand new to posting here. I'm hoping for some info about planting Oriental lily bulbs. I planted a large order of Oriental lily bulbs shortly after they arrived by mail in Sept/2004. The bulbs were all beautiful, large bulbs. They all grew well. We had a very mild fall, and these lilies grew 6 - 8 inches before we finally had a killing frost. I live in upstate NY which is a zone 5. In the past, I have always planted lily bulbs in the spring of the year. This spring, all these lilies are coming up like little blades of grass. They don't look like they will flower this year. Did all the storage from the bulb go into the top growth that occured in the fall? Since they did not have a chance to go through their full cylce of flowering and then building up the bulb again, essentially there was only a very small bulb that overwintered? Will these now take a long time to get big enough to flower in the near future? I don't know if I can talk to the mail order company - it really was not their fault, nor was it mine. I just planted them when they arrived. Was this the incorrect thing to do? Thanks for your help in advance.

Hello and welcome to Dave's Garden.

I don't know the answer to the question you asked but I'm sure if you copy the above and post it in the Lily Forum someone will be glad to give their opinion.

Judy

Welcome to Davesgarden!

Welcome to Dave's. I hope you found the answers you needed.

Fairydust_2, Wish I knew about Lilies- I mostly grow plants native to New Mexico. Used to live in upstate NY, 20+years ago in a little village near Utica- didn't have lilies there either. Anyhoo- welcome to the garden, you're gonna love it. :-)
angele