My Lily of the Nile was blooming great but now the blooms are spent and seeds are hanging from the spent blooms. Do I just remove the head from the stem or should the stem be cut back to the foliage to encourage new blooms?
Encouraging blooms for Lily of the Nile (dwarf Peter Pan)
I would like to know this also. I finally cut the stem off of mine cause it finally turned brown and started drooping. Haven't seen any new blooms coming up yet. This is one plant that I manage to kill every year. Can't get the right watering schedule down, tips of leaves start turning brown, I check it , it's dry so I water. I was messin with it the other day pulling some dead leaves off of it and found that it was starting to rot. Guess I over watered it. This seems confusing really since I always see them planted next to ponds on the internet.
Nile Lilies or Agapanthus can't take too much water or they rot. They difinitely need to be in a raised bed. Mine are in a raised bed and then even slightly raised in that bed by planting the root ball slightly higher that the surrounding bed and then mounding the soil around them. I've had good results with this, although I did kill a few of them before figuring this out! Mine only get additional water about every two weeks, even in the heat of summer. With these, it's definitely safer to err on the too dry side rather than too wet. As far as I know, and it's been my experience, that they'll only bloom once per year. They may put up more than one bloom stalk per plant, but when they're done, that's it until next year. Hope this helps y'all.
Really? I'm totally bummed about that. We had 4 stems per plant, beautiful blooms for the last 2 months. We've still got a lot of summer left and my parents are visiting from WI in September. I was hoping the garden would be looking great by then. With the way this heat is, I think my peak month was June. By September I'm afraid I'll be lef with a bed of ASH!! (lol) Mine were planted in a regular bed with many other flowrs and got watered daily and seemed to do just great anyway. I read they will not tolerate a freeze so I guess I will overwinter them in the greenhouse. Thanks for the 411!
I know you're a bit north or me , but my agapanthus have overwintered here for years without any problem, just mulch. We've had a few hard freezes in that time and they didn't seem affected. September color is easier than you might think. If you don't have any perennials that will provide color at that time, you can always throw out a couple of flats of annuals to perk things up. Perennials and shrubs that will still be blooming in July are crepe myrtles, esperanza, butterfly bush, plumbago, salvias, hibiscus, cannas and roses. Tender perennials include impatiens, salvia, blue daze, periwinkles, begonias, purslane, pentas and portulaca. Copper plants, perilla and crotons provide very colorful foliage until the first hard freeze. Wave petunias also do well once the worst of the July and August heat is over. I have pictures of a number of these plants in my journal file. Feel free to take a look and ask any questions you may have. I know there are a lot of other plants that would work that I haven't listed, but these are some of the ones I've had the best luck with.
Thanks Crowelli! I'm sure all our plants will be great in the fall and winter. I was teasing about the bed of ash because of all the heat and no rain. Sure wish we'd get some! But I'm glad the agapanthus will overwinter fine without the greenhouse! Will you be at the Dallas swap?
I won't make it to the Dallas swap this year. I'm getting ready for a trip to Scotland in a few weeks, so I'll miss this one. I have to admit it's worth missing in order to make it to Scotland though! If you go, let me know what I missed.
And greenie - if you'd like to see what crowellli's yard looks like (it's beautiful) go to Yard of the Month - Houston. She know of which she speaks - or something like that.
I have a large patch of Agapanthus, and even though they "only" bloom for about 6 weeks, they are well worth it. I leave the seed pods on for awhile, because I think they are attractive. I tried to plant some on the other side of the bed - sort of to balance it out, and they were too near a sprinkler head. Rotted fast, even in a raised bed. Well, the edged of a raised bed, and it is lower there. And they were big, beautiful plants when they left the store.
ceejay, do any of the agapanthus bloom at different times of the year according to the variety? Somer earlier and some later like lilies?
I have several varieties. Mine all bloom at the same time. There may be some out there, but I don't know about them. I doubt it, though.
Bummer.
Well, you just have to grow other plants that take the limelight when the Agapanthus are done. Look at it this way: If they bloomed all the time we would just get tired of them anyway. So this way they do their show, we are in awe, then they go away until the next time... Irises do the same. I go absolutely ga-ga when they are blooming in the spring. But it just doesn't seem to last very long. So I really appreciate them the next year when they do their thing again. It's like visitors. Leave while you're still wanted.
Okay, I feel completely stupid but I've looked all over the site....where can I find the link to Yard of the Month? (she asked sheepishly)
Oh good grief, I thought it was an entire DG thing...no wonder I couldn't find it!! =) Thanks CJ!! Plus, it doesn't help that I'm trying to do this and watch Alias DVDs at the same time!
Dual tasking, eh?
Not well obviously...I shouldn't do anything while watching Alias. We've never seen an episode and started with the season one DVDs about 3 weeks ago. We are totally hooked and are now in the middle of Season 4. Unfortunately the last season doesn't come out on DVD until October. I don't know if we'll make it that long (lol). But I always have time to worry about my back yard babies...even when watching Alias.