Nymphaea Caerulea (blue lily)

About to start to try and grow these! Any tips for germinating? I was going to soak in water over night then rub the outer coating of seed off and lightly press into soil with a slim sand layer on top and submerge in 2-3 inches of water. after germination they will go into a much bigger tub in deeper soil and under more water. not sure if I should use regular organic soil or maybe mix it with sand or perlite? ANY tips with these would be appreciated only have a couple seeds!

When I grew some tropical water lilies from seed so long ago, they were fairly easy to germinate and grow. Seems like I used sand like you mentioned in a small butter tub on the kitchen windowsill.

For lotus seed I filed the hard seed coat with a triangular jeweler's file to expose the embryo - just enough to see a little white speck and then did as you described about sand, a little water, etc. in a sunny windowsill until they germinated.

Looking at videos on YouTube shows you don't even need to file the hard coat either. Here is one such video out of possibly hundreds?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQZuyh3-F-s


When they are finally transplanted to a pond or a bigger bowl, the recommendations I found were to use a heavy clay soil as organic soil will float away (not heavy enough). Use fertilizer tablets made for water lilies and water lotus. The only issue I had with tropical water lilies was I had to dig them each fall and keep them overwinter. I removed all the leaves (not many in fall) and put them in a mason jar with Styrofoam peanuts and a little water. This worked well for the first two years but the third year they died - from drying out or some other pathogen?

https://m.wikihow.com/Grow-Lotus-Flower

THANKS! ill check out links right now. do you remember how long they took to germinate? looking it up get wide range of dates

A few days to two weeks but it was so long ago that I am probably wrong.

Haha yeh I have read a few days to a few months haha

Listen right now I had put soil and then water in one of those "simply fruit punch" containers. like a plastic O.J. container. I figured that would be big enough to germinate them then transplant. there is only maybe 2.5-3 inches of water in it. I saw pics of this being done on a site I read. However I forgot 1 part. In this "tutorial" the person put a small air stone in there to keep the O2 up in the water. Should this be done? The air stones I have are to big I could either get a really small one Or maybe skip the airstone and insert the tube straight into the water. Problem is when I tried that the air kicked up all the soil/sand. So I could add a couple inches of water and just let the tube sit just barely under the water. Hopefully that wouldn't kick up the soil to much. OR I could fill a bigger container with water and cut the top of this container down more and place it in the bigger container??? not sure if this is even really needed at this point or not?

ALSO should I add anything to the water to prevent any kind of algae growth. No growth now just thinking there might be if it takes weeks to months to germinate!?!? THANKS for the help!!!!

I wouldn't overthink this. Clean media, container, and seed. It will either germinate or it won't. Once it does, then you have your next issue - moving it up to a container and keeping it happy in winter? Algae - if it gets bad enough, try an algaecide - that is what I use for my small barrel pond. Once the leaves cover the water then the sun will be blocked to keep algae at a minimum anyway. I think the lily I have now is much too big for this half barrel pond anyway since it is mostly leaves and very few blooms.

So I got some germinated some look ok some are dying cant figure out why but I have 2 in a large plastic tub under a big light that are still small but growing.

I also got a blue lily tuber that was dormant and bringing it back alive I have it in a large glass bowl almost like a fish bowl I know it wont grow big here but the pads coming up are a redish brown color just hitting the surface. they should be green right? any idea what the problem is?

Reddish brown sounds about right for new leaves. Water lilies and water lotus do best in full sun.