crown rot advice please

My oriental lilies have crown rot. They are a couple of feet tall, and the leaves are healthy and vigorous but the crowns look melted--brown rotten mush. I found one site that mentioned stump rot and said to cut off the crown and use a copper fungicide on the ground--and wait for next year for blooms. These are too tall to be "stumps" but it looked like it might be the same ailment. My garden was under 3' of salt water during Sandy, so it might be connected, or not.
Thanks for any advice. Tamar

tamarmays,
You have my sympathy for what Sandy put you through. We have had quite a bit of cold and bitter weather: down to the 20's just a few days ago. My husband and I covered all of my lilies since last year when this happened a few of mine were turned to brown mush. I wonder if the plants got frost bitten or damaged by cold weather? I would just cut off the part that is mush and leave the rest to see what happens. Many of mine that were mushy last year survived and seem to be ready to bloom this year. Definitely trumpet lilies will easily be damaged by cold. Good luck.

The condition you describe is referred to as 'mushy top'. As Garden56 says, it is most often caused by a late frost. But it can also be caused by heavy dew in cool weather or misty cool days with little or no breeze to evaporate the moisture that accumulates in that new, tender top growth. If you cut the mushy part off and leave the rest of the stem and leaves to grow to feed the bulb it will be back normal next year. Mushy top and stump rot are two different things. Stump rot is associated with a bulb rotting condition underground.

Salt water flooding is never a good situation unless it killed some red lily beatles. It will be interesting to see what affect it has put on all garden plants for this year. Sodium ions are highly immobile and can remain in the soil long after. I would tend to think the concentration of salt from 'Sandy' would be quite low, however.

I think everybody in North America was 'glued' watching Sandy on TV. I live on the western shoreline of Lake Michigan and watched the extreme outer edge of the storm slowly inch it's way closer and closer until it finally covered us here, over 1000 miles to your west. That was really something!!!

Tamar, we did not get water. I'm happy to share lilies with you. Just give me a call and come over.
Marcia

I have what seems to be crown rot on a few of my lilies, all in ground. I don't think any of the lilies in containers were affected.