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| I do not grow any lotus in a pond, they are heavy
feeders and the amount of fertilizer needed will turn the
water green AND most of my fish are 30 inches and they would
have a "field day" with the lotus. |
| These lotus are "stock" plants we grow to
sell. In late January we harvest tubers and begin
shipping them in February. Around mid-March, when
we are done shipping and we start new plants for
shipping in 2 years. The rows of pots you
see will be allowed to grow for 2 years. We have
pots that are not shown that will be harvested in
January of 2005. |
| We start the tubers in the heated greenhouse and let
them grow until there is no danger of frost. After
frost danger is past, we move the huge pans outside and dig
them into the ground. This is how the bed looks before
we put down hardwood mulch to keep the weeds down. The pans
are watered with water from the well that has a pH of 6.0
and fertilized once a week. We have a fertilizer
injector that we use in the greenhouse that mixes the
fertilizer to right ratio of water |
| The tuber must be kept warm if it is to root and grow.
One trick if you keep your house on the cool side is to set
the pan on a heating pad that is set to "low". |
These pots were moved outside from the greenhouse in early
May and you can see the growth they made for late March to
early May about 6 weeks time. By June there will be a
sea of green leaves and flowers popping up everywhere! |
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This photo is one of my favorite, Sun Flower, and
nice deep clear pink. You can see that since
mid-March it has made great growth and is getting ready
to bloom. |
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