We have a largish natural pond in the UK - about 100ft across and 3ft
deep - in which we planted some water lilies about three years ago.
They now have a tall crown of leaves in the centre which I understand
means they need lifting and dividing next May/June.

This year I didn't have a lot of time but a half hearted attempt showed
they are not going to lift easily (i.e. I couldn't budge the room, which
is rooted in the bottom of the pond, not a container by hand or fork
leverage).

Draining is out of the question so its doing it in the water depth that
is there.

I also have concerns as last time I did a big spring clean on the
vegetation in the pond (mainly removing a load of invasive reeds) the
nutrients released by stirring up the bottom meant we had a major
duckweed problem all summer that didn't go until we got some decent
winter rain to flush the pond water through.

Any suggestions/hints would be welcome

--
Tony

"Well, it may be all right in practice, but it will never work in
theory."
Warren Buffett

On Sun, 24 Aug 2008 06:47:40 EDT, Tony Raven
wrote:

Draining is out of the question so its doing it in the water depth that
is there.

That sounds like you might wish to hire someone to do it, which is OK
with me, but I will suggest that I would use a back pack with some
weight, if you don't have a diving belt. It makes keeping your upper
body under the water much easier, even at such shallow depths it still
is deeper than my arm is long.
--
Hal Middle Georgia, Zone 8
http://tinyurl.com/2fxzcb

In article ,
says...
On Sun, 24 Aug 2008 06:47:40 EDT, Tony Raven
wrote:

Draining is out of the question so its doing it in the water depth that
is there.

That sounds like you might wish to hire someone to do it, which is OK
with me, but I will suggest that I would use a back pack with some
weight, if you don't have a diving belt. It makes keeping your upper
body under the water much easier, even at such shallow depths it still
is deeper than my arm is long.


I read that as diving bell the first time round ;-) If I hire someone
how will they do it? I wondered about trying to get a rope round the
roots and then pulling them out with a tractor. Or is there an easier
way without digging them up to remove some of the vigour e.g. pruning
out all the leaves in the central crown and leaving just the floating
leaves?

--
Tony

"It is hard enough to remember my opinions, without also remembering my
reasons for them"
- Friedrich Nietzsche

Tony Raven wrote:
If I hire someone
how will they do it? I wondered about trying to get a rope round the
roots and then pulling them out with a tractor. Or is there an easier
way without digging them up to remove some of the vigour e.g. pruning
out all the leaves in the central crown and leaving just the floating
leaves?

Almost every rural or even urban area that I have lived in has a County
Cooperative type thing where they answer farming and garden questions
almost always for free. Look up a local feed store and ask them how to
contact yours.

Chip

On Mon, 25 Aug 2008 09:29:53 EDT, Tony Raven
wrote:

I read that as diving bell the first time round ;-) If I hire someone
how will they do it?

I don't know, but in your search for someone to clear growth from the
bottom of a 3' deep pond, you may find someone with experience of
either clearing vegetation or making canals deeper and equipment for
such tasks. A dragline comes to mind, but I haven't seen any such
devices in operation in years. The bottom will be churned well, no
matter which mechanical means you choose.

I wondered about trying to get a rope round the
roots and then pulling them out with a tractor. Or is there an easier
way without digging them up to remove some of the vigour e.g. pruning
out all the leaves in the central crown and leaving just the floating
leaves?

Rope and cable have a danger of lashing you if they break, so I'd
suggest chain, since it is more likely simply to drop in place if it
breaks.

Sorry, I doubt there is an easy way. The problem is the feeder roots
extending from the tuber or larger roots are most numerous and extend
into the mud by 6 to 8 inches and anchor into about a gallon of mud
for every 6 to 8 inches of tuber, that is my guess, but it is heavy
and depending on the length of the tuber or big root the attached mass
could be more than I could pull with my feet on the bottom and lifting
up. This is all guesswork on my part, since I keep my lilies in 3
gallon buckets and divide them at least the second year, and many are
only allowed one year in a pot. To get them out of the pots, (They
grow till the pot is filled with no clearance between the mud roots
and pot sides.) I take them out of the pond turn the pots upside down
and walk away for a while. When the water drains out the plants fall
out of the pots and I no longer have the hand strength to break them
apart, so I use a hatchet to separate, or chop off the corms or leaf
sprouts along with a bit of the tuber for food and set them in a new
pot for next year.

I hope my guessing is helpful, but I've never seen anyone clear a pond
of water lilies. Another personal thought is the lilies will take
care of themselves settling as the nutrients are used at the present
points of rapid overgrowth. This is a guess based on an incident that
I caused. Once a year fertilizer spikes wasn't available locally, so
I picked a spike from a couple tree fertilizers that looked like they
might be close enough to work on lilies. They releases so much
nitrogen into the lily pot the plants hardly bloomed, however the lily
pads that are normally 6 to 8 inches were over a foot in diameter that
year.

I think you are very fortunate and I would simply add lotus to the
pond and in a few years it will cover the lilies and you could have
something like this:
http://www.koiphen.com/forums/showth...ighlight=lotus

I only had one plant per pot, but you could have a 100' diameter pond
of these beauties.
--
Hal Middle Georgia, Zone 8
http://tinyurl.com/2fxzcb

Hal wrote:
I don't know, but in your search for someone to clear growth from the
bottom of a 3' deep pond, you may find someone with experience of
either clearing vegetation or making canals deeper and equipment for
such tasks. A dragline comes to mind, but I haven't seen any such
devices in operation in years. The bottom will be churned well, no
matter which mechanical means you choose.

I asked about this EXACT same thing about 2 weeks ago. I spent about 6
hours sitting on the bottom of the pond pulling the roots out - clearing
about a 10-x20' area in that time.

It was exhausting work and I left the plants sitting in the water. My
plan is to take a 16' "cattle panel" (a very heavy gauge wire fence) and
drag it with my tractor to at least clear out the already pulled
weeds/mud.

My thought is, after I get the pulled ones out, to attach a heavy metal
angle iron bar to the bottom of the cattle panel and try to drag it
again - hopefully the roots will break before the cattle panel does....

We'll see.


--

+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +
Chris Barnes AOL IM: CNBarnes
Yahoo IM: chrisnbarnes
"Usenet really is all about standing around and hitting the ground
with clubs, on a spot where many years earlier a dead horse lay."

In article ,
says...

I think you are very fortunate and I would simply add lotus to the
pond and in a few years it will cover the lilies and you could have
something like this:
http://www.koiphen.com/forums/showth...ighlight=lotus

I only had one plant per pot, but you could have a 100' diameter pond
of these beauties.


Thanks for the suggestions Hal, I think I might try cutting back the
leaves and make them exhaust their soil a bit quicker growing new ones.
They are not invasive, they just don't look as good as when all the pads
are floating on the water.

As for the lotus suggestion I am trying to create something like this:
http://tinyurl.com/6mnkkj

not like this:
http://tinyurl.com/6lgglu

So I'll pass on that suggestion ;-)

--
Tony

"I never make stupid mistakes. Only very, very clever ones."
- John Peel

Tony Raven wrote:

As for the lotus suggestion I am trying to create something like this:
http://tinyurl.com/6mnkkj


But then you would have to reincarnate Monet to paint it.
Chip

In article , says...
Tony Raven wrote:

As for the lotus suggestion I am trying to create something like this:
http://tinyurl.com/6mnkkj


But then you would have to reincarnate Monet to paint it.


Just buy the Monet plugin for Photoshop - sorted! ;-)

--
--
Tony

"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one."
--Albert Einstein

I have a large pond that had water lilies that were over 20 years old.
I wanted to clean out the pond, so I drained it. It turned out that
only one water lilly was left but that its tuber was over 200 feet long
and had grown in a serpentine pattern all over the pond with nodes
coming up at many different places. I broke off foot long sections to
plant. This time I put in concrete pads and placed the sections in lilly
pots placed on the concrete pads so the tubers could not escape. This
is working well. Now all I have to do to take care of the lilies is
take out the pots. Much easier than draining the pond.

I highly recommend trying to get the lilies out of the soil in the pond
and containerizing them unless you want them to take over.


Tony Raven wrote:

We have a largish natural pond in the UK - about 100ft across and 3ft
deep - in which we planted some water lilies about three years ago.
They now have a tall crown of leaves in the centre which I understand
means they need lifting and dividing next May/June.

This year I didn't have a lot of time but a half hearted attempt showed
they are not going to lift easily (i.e. I couldn't budge the room, which
is rooted in the bottom of the pond, not a container by hand or fork
leverage).

Draining is out of the question so its doing it in the water depth that
is there.

I also have concerns as last time I did a big spring clean on the
vegetation in the pond (mainly removing a load of invasive reeds) the
nutrients released by stirring up the bottom meant we had a major
duckweed problem all summer that didn't go until we got some decent
winter rain to flush the pond water through.

Any suggestions/hints would be welcome
--
Pardon my spam deterrent; send email to
18,000 gallon (17'x 47'x 2-4') lily pond garden in Zone 6
Cheers, Steve Henning in Reading, PA USA

It sounds like you planted a rather large, strong growing variety.

Odorata hybrids can scoot around at the rate of six to fifteen foot a year, those can be a lark to trot after to keep up with.

Assuming its a natural pond with mud, gravel, sand, clay, bottom, the tether roots of the lily are likely to be four to six foot long and lash the rhisome to the bottom rather well...

To thin them out, a sharp knife (and something to sharpen it well) might be useful. Cut a line parallel to the rhisome downwards and inwards a few inches from the rhisome

When the tether roots are severed you will find the rhisomes wiggle out rather easy

Bad luck, if you planted those bare root on a liner pond...

While large fast growing varieties initially create an impression of 'growing great' and rather cheap, the long term liability is something that needs checking.

Alas a lot of unsuitable plants come on to the market rather cheap, with inadequate or misleading cultivation information

Regards, andy
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