First Calla Lily

My first calla lily!

Gorgeous! I've never grown one before, so it's nice to see photos :)

Steve

This is my first. Those white spots are actually clear...not white, not holes...the leaf membrane is there, it is just clear. My sis gave me the bulbs and hers has white spots where mine are clear, so I think it is just a quirk....maybe Spring fever that will correct as the plants mature.

Thats neat, I think I read something like that in another thread before. It'll proabaly correct itself like you said.
How long did it take from planting till flowering?

Steve

Hmmm...good question. Let me think...I put in my lily garden about two and a half months ago. It took another week or two before I got around to planting all the bulbs. Then the Calla lilies kind of seemed to stay dormant for a week or two before they did anything...I'm guessing about eight weeks form planting to bloom. The callas, Irises, gloriosa lilies and crocomansias were the slowest of all the bulbs to respond. The Irises are just now coming up...which is weird because so many people in cooler climates have flowers now...but maybe it is because I was late getting them in the ground. Not sure if any of the crocomansias will come up...I think I have some glads bordering that section of the garden and that is what is coming up there. It took FOREVER for the Gloriosas to come up. Three of them still can't make up their minds. You can see the tips of the blubs and you can tell they are still viable....but they just haven't put up any green yet. Oh well, they say once you get Gloriosa lilies, you have tons of them, so the three that are doing fine will more than fill their share of the bed.

I like how your lily garden isn't just planted with Lilium lilies, but all sorts.
Do the gloriosa's actualy climb? I've haven't tried alot of summer planted bulbs.
Can you take pictures of your lily bed? I would love to see it!

Steve

Mine aren't large enough to climb yet, but my sister, who gave them to me, warned me to plant them where they could climb over over other plants. I didn't...oops...my bad...LOL! I wasn't sure which of my plants would tolerate being 'trampled' by the Gloriosa...I probably should have planted them by the mailbox so they could climb the Four O'Clocks...but they probably would not have come up because the Four O'Clocks have really bushed out. I'll probably have to put some sort of trellis in for them to climb as they get bigger. I do have a couple of things in my 'lily' garden that aren't lilies....I have some lavender, celiosa, ginger, a dahlia and salvia. Other than those I have Callas, Cannas, Gladioloas, Daylilies, Asian lilies, crinum lilies and red hot pokers, Gloriosa lilies, Bearded Iris, Walking Iris, Dutch Iris, Liatris, and Peruvian Daffodils (which are really a lily). Some of the plants are actually tubers, but most of the stuff in there are some sort of tuber or bulb. I call it my lily garden because most of the plants are related to the lily family...but I did want to break it up some with the other things.

I'll take a pic and post it tomorrow. I'm just to wiped out from being out there for two hours in 97 degree heat to even think about going back out right now! LOL! We dn't have a sprinkler system and only have one water sipot so it takes me a good two hours to water everything. Before next summer I plan to get a plumbr out here to add another spigot so I can just turn on sprinklers and stay inside where it is cool. I've got some pics that are a couple of weeks old, but it has grown so much in just two weeks. Next week it will grow even more as my sister is bringing me some more crinums, daylilies, Peruvian daffodils and some spike lavender...among tother things. I'm going to be busy, busy, busy. Oh, and I havwe 41 daylily scapes coming up, so in a week or two it will be awash with color.

Woo, You have quite a collection of bulbs! My collection is slllloooowwwwllllly growing. I bought my first dahlia tuber this year and it's doing very well. How are your daylilies dong? The foliage on some of mine is getting all flecked with little brown lines. I'm not sure if its our crazy weather or some sort of insect. I'll have to take a closer look. A number of my plants are growing strange this year, the beebalm is turning yellow and so are some of my lilies, so I don't know if it's the soil in that area or the weather. I put down some epsom salts a few days ago....so maybe I should put down more.

It's been very hot here also the past few days, up in the 90's and humid. I don't want to complain about the heat cause our growing season isn't very long here, but it's sooo hot.

Steve

Well, it took me a couple of days, but I finally got out with the camera.

Here is a pic of the lily garden from the front

And here it is from the back. The bare patches are reserved for some more flowers Lisa is bringing me next week.

Steve,

The problems you are having sound to me like they are related to heat and inadequate water. I'm not an expert, but I grew up down here in the heat and if I don't water often enough (or if I water too often!) I can get some of the same results. I've never been to Cananda, but I imagine that the heat wave you've been having is a bit much this early in the year for your plants so they are going to need additonal water due to evaporation. Try to make sure to water them really well in the morning to help prevent fungus from watering too alte in the day and to keep from causing damage to them from the water being on them in the heat of the day. (Easier said than done for most of us! This is definately a case of do as I say, not as I do, because I rarely see daylight before about mid day!)

Well.....if I have to water in the morning then I'll have to get up earlier. I'm not an early bird :) I never thought of not enough water, cause we have had some good rains but there has been several days inbetween, enough to dry everything out.. Our weathers been going from one extreme to the next, a couple weeks ago it was near 32F and then it shot up to blazing hot and sunny and it's (a good)cooler today and cloudy. Thanks for your advice, I'll be sure to do morning watering.......some of my plants don't look pretty.

Thanks,
Steve

Those temperture extremes are probably a lot to blame. I don't know many plants that can take a freeze and a couple of weeks later can handle 90+ heat.

I hear you on the mornings. Ugh! I have not been able to reset my clock to 'normal' hours in years. When I try, it just makes my lupus flare. I end up not sleeping at all for days and days....then suddenly I sleep for two or three days straight when the lupus rears its ugly head. And that doesn't do anybody any good. I just have to go with whatever my body's natural clock says...and it says to stay up till 2-4 AM and sleep till noon or later. Of course, it doesn't help that I get night terrors during the night, either. I'm fine in the daytime...but when I try to sleep at night, I am plagued by the most horrific dreams and wake up thinking they are real, with my heart pounding so hard it feels like I am going to have a heart attack.

Oh, my goodness! Thats terrible! You're right though, it's always best to do what your body tells you, when it comes to health. Do you still get the dreams even when you go to bed at like 4? I've never really had many night terrors or things like that, but if you don't have one thing, there's always something else to fill it's spot. And when the 'ball' has been 'rolling' to smoothly, you know something will come up.

Steve

Yep....never trust life when it gets dull....LOL!

I've had the night terrors since I was a kid. I guess I was pretty impressionable when Charles Manson turned his family loose on California and I am prone to night terrors of home invasions...but I have others as well. Yes, I still get them when I go to sleep at 4AM, but they run in cycles...I'll go weeks without them, then 'boom' I'll have them daily for a couple of weeks or so. I used to think it was hormonal. but I had all my plumbing removed three years ago, so it isn't that. I am more prone to them anytime I am feeling insecure about something...but anything can set them off. It is odd that I don't get them when I sleep in the day, though. They started when I was a kid after a traumatic event and have been with me ever since.

It's awful what traumatic events can do to us. When I was about 5 our family car started to burn up when we were in it and when I was about 6 or 7 (couldn't swim) my friend tricked me into going into the deep end of the pool so I'd fall in. I almost drowned. Only a few years ago did I finally start taking private swimming lessons and I still won't dive into the pool unless I'm at a lesson. Just an idea, but have you ever looked into homeopathics? They're natural remedies for different heath problems and they're often diagnosed by strange symptoms like your nightmares happening during the day and not at night. I've taken them, so I know they work.

Steve

My nightmares are only in the nighttime...never in the day. The actual root cause is that when I was about 10, I was molested. The guy lived in the neighborhood and kept threatening to drag me back into the woods and 'finish what he started'. Because of his constant threats, I was too terrified to sleep at night and could not go to sleep until my parents got up the next day. It lasted the whole summer. Once school started, I was better, but I don't think I slept all that well at night because I used to take naps in the afternoon a lot. After a couple of years, the predator made the mistake of molesting another little girl. There ws an artist's sketch of him in the paper. I told my parents that if they would not report it, I would call the police myself because I knew the guy's name and where he lived. (Empowerment 101, if you can't get justice, find out everything you can about the person who victimized you, then you hold the upper hand...even if you are only a kid!) He was eventually sent to the state mental hospital for a few years.

I was in therapy for a few years and it helped some. But I still get nightmares and night terrors and sleep better in the daytime....

I also almost drowned when I was a kid. There was a public swimming pool near my grandparents' house that we used to go to. They had a rope dividing the deep and and the shallow end. I had never really learned to swim, so I always stayed in the shallow end. However, I loved to float on my back. I guess the rope was too loose and somehow I floated over it into the deep end. When I tried to stand up, I was in way over my head. I panicked. I was going under for the third time when Lisa saw me and dove in and pulled me to the side. The lifeguard hadn't even ntoiced what was going on..but my 'big' sister jumped in and saved my life. She'd had swimming lessons when she was 5, but my mom had some health problems and never got around to taking me to swimming lessons. Eventually I learned to swim...but at that time all I could do was dog paddle and float.

Sorry, I meant during the night and not the day. I sometimes get/do things backwards. I'm so sorry about what happened when you were a kid and forgive me if I was too forward in my last post. I didn't mean to pry or anything.

I forgot to mention before how much I like your cannas in your lily garden. They're very bold.

Steve :)

That's OK. I knew you were trying to help. Some things homeopathy can help. Some things therapy can help...to some extent. Some things haunt you for life.

Thanks BammaBelle. I hope the best for you with this.

Steve

I've lived with it for 36 years....The good Lord willing I'll live with for another 36....

Thats a very positive attitude you have. And thats really good :)

Thanks. Attitude really is EVERYTHING. If you don't believe me, ask an oncologist.

I believe you :)