Best Tropical Waterlilies For Tub Water Gardens

Best Tropical Waterlilies For Tub Gardens

Leaf-Spread is a standard nomenclature in the horticultural world to denote nymphaea species and cultivars typical lilypad coverage. Generally 1'-3' for small and pygmy lilies, 3'-5' for Medium, and 5'+ for Large varieties. For container water gardeners, your best tropical waterlily choices are medium spread varieties at most.

Popular Small Waterlilies For Container Gardening

My #1 recommendation for tropical tub gardener's is the reliable and resilient pale blue Dauben^#Ad waterlily (sometimes listed as Daubenyana.) It has small lilypads and limited spread, is extremely free-flowering, and more shade and cool water tolerant than nearly any other tropicals. Dauben is the best beginner tropical waterlily, period.

Also recommended: Lavender with deep purple stamens - pygmy waterlily Colorata^#Ad is an excellent, free-blooming eye-catching choice for a mini-pond as well.

Color Range Of Tropicals

Unlike hardy waterlily cultivars, the inclusion of blue and purple hues that are available only in tropical nymphaea makes them highly sought out for inclusion in the garden landscape. Equallly notable are the stamens at the center of the flower that often correlate with the petals surrounding them.

Try Both Day & Night Blooming Tropicals

Growing both daytime and nocturnal varieties of tropical water lilies can extend viewing enjoyment - Especially important for 9-5 dayshift workers who largely miss out on the day bloomer's optimal flowering period. Night bloomers typically open at dusk and remain open till around 9am.

Colors Of Night Blooming Waterliilies

Night bloomer water lilies are limited to white, pink and red shades. There are no blue to purple nor yellow cultivars that have been hybridized for sale. Particularly in the tropics, notably South America, there are many native species of nocturnal waterlilies - but many have small, uninspired whitish flowers that may only open for an hour or two in the wee hours of the night. In short they're not very pretty nor impressive, and are not desirable for the avid water gardener. They have little commercial appeal to consumers or even horticultural enthusiasts.

Cheap Night-Blooming Tiger Lotus

The most affordable way to grow a night blooming waterlily is buying what aquarium suppliers often call 'Tiger Lotus' bulbs. Red Tiger Lotus may bloom in white to pink to magenta to red shades (Nymphaea Rubra species) or Green Tiger Lotus (Nymphaea Zenkeri) which typically has creamy white blossoms with yellow centers.

Tiger Lotus are often sold as submerged aquarium plants for their attractive and often speckled and mottled underwater basal leaves. But given full sun and warm water outdoors they'll readily send adult lilypads to the surface and bloom at night.