Dying Lilies

Hi All - Hoping for some help. Spring of 2014 I planted several lilies. I used fencing to protect them from the rabbits. This year, they came up beautifully and went into full bloom. They had been healthy until recently.
We have an irrigation system under the wood chips that is set on a timer for 5am and 1pm daily. We feed the flowers as directed. This process / system is what we've done for a few years without a problem.
As you can see from the pictures, they are burning up from the bottom. Is that rot from over watering or is there a bug that would do this? I have sprayed for bugs but that didn't seem to improve the condition.

any help is very appreciated.

Thank you
Deb18

Deb,
Stupid question, but you say they were in full bloom and gorgeous, but now are going downhill. I'm not an expert, but many of my lilies have also bloomed and now the foliage is naturally dying back; this gives the bulb the energy for blooms next year. I'm not sure if your browning from the bottom up is a problem or natural dying back. I might be niave, but just my thoughts...You've still got alot of healthy-like green leaves there, just brown at the tips. Not sure if this is nature dying back or either too much or not enough (?) watering. Where is the irrigation system situated? Is ir right under/next to the plant (where the plant meets the ground?) If too wet, it could be rot if the water is not draining well enough (?) My lily foliage is dying back for those that have bloomed a bit ago (my stargazers have just finished). But not necessarily dying from the bottom up.
It's hard for me to tell from the photos anything further. I see holes in a few leaves, which is probably a bug but your lily leaves are not riddled with holes as in being attacked big time

That's not the look of the natural dying-off that occurs after blooming in fall - when this happens, the foliage remains healthy-looking but gradually turns yellow, and then eventually dries up completely.

This looks like botrytis.

For next time, unless you actually see insect infestation and can actually link it to the plant symptoms, don't bother spraying poisons around - it will not be effective (as you said it was not in this case) and will cause collateral harm to other organisms.

See, I knew someone knew better than I!
Alta is a seasoned gardener and seems to always have alot of answers/input :o)

Thank you all...
No this isn't the usual die off. Only 1/2 of my lilies are doing this. Just one side of the house and the irrigation system is all the way around the house so all the lilies and other flowers are getting the same water treatment each day...which I double checked is only once per day not twice as I originally thought.
How do I combat botrytis? I see it's a fungus but how do I reverse this?

Thanks much

The botrytis is probably linked either to your daily watering (which is quite an unusual thing to do) or to climatic conditions this season - in either case to excessive moisture and/or humidity, both of which promote fungal disease. Given that not all your lilies are affected, I'd guess it's some combination of the daily watering plus the conditions on the affected side of the house - maybe more shade causing the soil to remain wetter? Maybe soil that holds more moisture? Fewer other plants, e.g. trees, that would also be taking up all that moisture? I don't know, not enough info.

There isn't any way to restore life to the dead stems, but you can try to stop the spread to the other stems by ceasing the constant watering and only watering when needed - I don't know your climate but it may be more in the order of weekly or every 10 days in periods without rain. (You should look up some local gardening info to get a sense for what experienced gardeners do there.) Make this a good soaking, and then allow the soil to dry out normally between waterings.


This message was edited Aug 7, 2015 9:15 PM

val- there are no stupid questions when it comes to... anything! how close to the lillies is the fence? could it possibly be a wandering cat thats 'marking' its territory? urine from cats that roam my neighborhood plays havoc on my plants every year- of course if theyre all getting watered daily i cant see them getting burned by it... are the stems affected? or just the leaves- id dig them up and check what you can see underground and the bulbs themselves-