Q: I have a new pond and I planted a hardy waterlily. It sends up flower buds for a few days. They never open and then they die. What do you think is going wrong and how do I fix it?
A: I think that if you work from home for a few days, you may find the flowers are opening up during the day. It sounds like you have accomplished the tasks of fertilizing, giving them enough full sun and having warm water that give other people problems getting their waterlilies to bloom.
Hardy waterlilies only open during the middle of the day. Each blossom opens mid-morning and closes in the late afternoon. If you work during the day and don’t get home early enough, you will miss the flowers. You get to see them on the weekends. Each individual flower will only last a few days. After the flower stalk bends over and the flower goes under the water, it will begin producing seeds. You don’t want seeds; you want more flowers, so cut off the flowers as they begin folding over to go underwater.
Hardy waterlilies are yellow, white, pink, red and changeable. The changeable flowers start out one color on the first day, begin fading to another color on the second day and finish changing on the third day.
If there is room in the pond, you may want to plant a tropical waterlily. These lilies are perennials in areas that have warm water during the winter, or they are treated as annuals in areas where the water freezes during the winter. Tropical waterlilies come as day bloomers or as night bloomers. You should plant one of each. The day-blooming tropical waterlily flowers open longer than the hardy waterlily flowers. The tropical waterlily plants will often send out two or three times more flowers than a hardy lily.
The night bloomers are the ones that will get the most attention. They will not only open before you get home in the evening, but they will also usually last until mid-morning the next day. Many night bloomers are also very fragrant, which adds to the beauty of these flowers. The white flowers stand out at night, especially on moonlit nights.
Tropical waterlilies come in the same colors as the hardy lilies but also come in intense blue and purple colors. While hardy waterlilies usually just float on the water surface, many tropical waterlilies hold their flowers 6 to 12 inches above the water.
Tropical waterlilies can be grown in a flowerpot in the pond over the summer and then moved indoors in the winter if you are in a cold climate. The plant will go into a sort of dry dormancy if you take it out of the pond in the fall, cut all the leaves off and place the pot in a sealed black plastic bag. Keep the pot in a dark, cool basement or closet until spring.
Your hardy waterlily can stay in the pot during the summer, with the pot lowered to the bottom of the pond in the winter. It can also be planted into the rocks if your pond is lined with boulders and gravel. In any case, the hardy waterlily rhizome and roots cannot be encased in ice over the winter. They must be low enough in the pond that the ice does not reach them.
