Water colours

WATER LILIES BASK IN THE SUN, HAVE COLOURS THAT CHALLENGE THE CROWN JEWELS’ BRILLIANCE AND GIVE OFF THE MOST INTOXICATING SCENT

Paint a beautiful picture at your place with wonderful water lilies

YOU CAN MAKE LIKE MONET AND PAINT A BEAUTIFUL PICTURE IN YOUR GARDEN WITH WATER LILIES

from their brightly coloured, star-like flowers to the mooncrater shapes of the floating leaves, water lilies are out of this world. Better than any painting, a garden pond filled with water lilies is a living, breathing vision of beauty – and a tribute to the astonishing ways plants work.

WHERE TO GROW

You can grow water lilies almost anywhere in Australia and, as long as there’s a daily dose of sun, you can have these floating starbursts from October through to April. ‘Hardy’ lilies grow from Hobart to northern NSW and can flower in temperatures as low as 18 degrees, but get petal burn when it’s warmer than 32 degrees.

‘Tropical’ lilies thrive in the north of Australia. Their root tubers are susceptible to harsh frosts, but you can grow them as an annual in the south. Otherwise, you can have water lilies blooming in your pond indefinitely, as the tropical tubers and hardy rhizomes are self-perpetuating.

TAKING CARE

Those big, flat circular leaves are the plant’s lungs

and, if water settles on them, they will suffocate

- so don’t plant if there will be splashes from a water feature. Hardy water lilies need four hours of sun a day, tropicals need sun all day. Apart from the night-blooming water

lilies, most flowers peak at mid-morning, They need at least 20cm of water over the tuber/rhizome growing tip (crown). Fertilise during the growing season with slowrelease fertilising tablets pushed into the soil.

Water lilies may look like they belong in the tropics, but many members of the Nymphaeaceae family actually thrive in cooler climates. In the north of Australia, you can grow tropical varieties that flower year-round. Many also grow in the southern states, but should be considered an annual. For regular blooms, southerners can grow cold-tolerant, hardy water lilies.

Put these pink tropical water lilies (Nymphaea nouchali – versicolor) on your wish list. They are also cold tolerant, so will grow in the north and south of Australia.