Need help with my Lily

[Av8er]

i built a small 4’ x 8’ x 3’ above ground pond last year and put a few goldfish and a couple tropical water lilies in it. Everything is going fine but I have a question about one of my water lilies. It’s stalk (don’t know the technical term) keeps growing taller and taller. I prune the dying pads after they start turning colors last year and it just keeps growing taller. Pic is attached. It’s to the point now that it’s tall and unstable. It is starting to grow pads again and I was wondering how to manage it. Can I cut it off at the base or will that kill it? Am I supposed to prune it somehow? Any help would be appreciated. Thanks in advance for your help.

 

[adavisus]

It looks like a hardy waterlily rhizome. Growing it among rock is exposing it to fish grazing. You might try repotting it where its roots can anchor into a heavy, fertile dirt such as a dark loam. Did you get photos of it when it bloomed?

 

[Av8er]

I did not!! It’s root ball is massive and is under the lava rock. Every time it sprouts a lily pad it grows I height when I cut off the dying pads. This is the type.

Also, the fish don’t bother it. They do like the media though that why I just added the lava rock.

 

[Lisak1]

What you're seeing is part of the tuber - you can trim the tuber into separate parts, but each piece needs to have a growing tip. Your pot appears so be too small. Many people find that shallow wide pans (like an oil change pan or dishpan) work better than the pots lilies come in from the nursery. They like to grow across the pot. If they can't, they will grow out like yours has.

 

[Av8er]

That makes sense. So if I want to split it, do I cut I’d down the middle and separate the doors on each half once I get to the base? Also, what do you do once it grows all the way across the new pan? This thing grew as much as you see showing in 8 months. So in no time it will be out grown other pans.

 

[Jhn]

Once it grows across the pan/pot it needs to be divided again.

When dividing the lily don't cut through the growing tip. You can cut the tuber where it splits off. Each portion must have a growing tip, cut across the tuber horizontally not down the middle vertically.

 

[Lisak1]

Right - what @Jhn said. You break off parts of the tuber that contain growing tips, but not down the middle. And they can be as tiny as your pinkie finger, as long as they have that little part that is sprouting.

And yes, once it outgrows the pan, you divide it again! Lather, rinse, repeat!

 

[adavisus]

Tropical waterlilies don't usually form rhisomes like hardy waterlilies, which travel horizontal. That one has grown vertical which is a bit odd. I'd ground the growing part to get it to root into good fertile soil, before the odd tuber decides to rot off, see if it can sprout new crowns, root in and form new tubers through Summer. Tubers of trop lilies only last a year or two

Fortunately Panama Pacific is viviparous, that's another way to grow a future plant