This is a wonderful tropical lily. I've had it for years, overwintering it under lights indoors (zone 5 NH). It's a little late to bloo...Read Morem compared with buying a new plant, but I love just keeping it going from year to year. This past March the plants looked like they might not make it in my basement, so I popped them into a well-lighted aquarium and they took off, even setting some buds before going outside. I kept one small plant in the aquarium, and it now has 2 buds (early Sept.) I didn't know they could bloom in an aquarium! I look forward to seeing the vivid blue indoors all winter, and savoring the delicious fragrance.
Since I live in a cold climate I mostly grow hardy lilies, but there are no blue hardies. Nora is the best blue in my opinion, and the only tropical I currently grow. Surely the richest purplish blue color I have seen. It freely sets new tubers, and even an occasional baby from a leaf node, as it is viviparous. (I understand in hot areas the babies of "vips" sometimes bloom while still on the leaf, but I've never seen this happen. Usually I just find a tiny plant where the leaf has rotted, and I tuck it into the pot beside the parent until it's big enough for its own container, or I put up a pot full of babies. I enjoy sharing them with friends, and always keep at least one growing in a barrel planter on my deck.
I once gave a clone of Nora to my sister, who kept it in a bucket on her back steps in SC, zone 8a. She didn't even take it in over winter. The bucket froze over sometimes, but the plant's tubers did not, and it recovered and bloomed again next season. So 9a as the lowest zone is overly cautious for Nora. In general the viviparous lilies are known to be hardier than other tropicals. Maybe she got lucky because the shelter of the house provided a slightly milder microclimate. But if you are trying to decide between treating this plant as an annual and leaving it outdoors to tough it out, I'd say zone 8 folks can try the tough-it-out approach.
Bluish-purple blooms surrounded by varigated leaves. Requires full to partial sun and has a small to medium spread that makes it great fo...Read Morer small ponds or tubs as well as large ponds. This tropical is also viviparous.
This is a wonderful tropical lily. I've had it for years, overwintering it under lights indoors (zone 5 NH). It's a little late to bloo...Read More
Bluish-purple blooms surrounded by varigated leaves. Requires full to partial sun and has a small to medium spread that makes it great fo...Read More