HELP! what is cutting my lilies?

I am finding some of my lilies that are cut off about mid-stem. Not eaten. All the leaves - well mostly all the leaves - are still there, a few have been stripped and/or eaten. Mostly they are just nipped and toppled over. Nothing but the lilies are attacked. Front and backyards. Some of the nip-offs are 18" off the ground. Are there any really TALL rabbits? Front and backyards. This has happened to about 7 so far... No deer - my whole backyard is 5' chain link fence.

WHAT is doing this and how do I protect the rest of the lilies I have? I saw a dog do this once but no dogs now in my backyard for sure.

TIA,
Sterling
Atlanta, zone 7

its deer....5' feet fence is nothing to a deer

Well, I've never seen hoof marks or droppings but it is sure not impossible. That said, the ONLY plants touched are the lilies. Nothing else.

Sure sounds like deer. They love lillies. Looks just like all my lillies and I have caught them with their lilly eating lips on them.
I am not sure what else would eat something so high (18"). Deer will come in all hours of the day and night, but will strip a lilly garden in one evening while you sleep. (with very quiet chewing)

I thought lilies were extremely poisonous. Apparently not to deer....

Well, it can be fatal to deer. After their grazing on about 250 dollars worth of lillies, I went out and bought a bow and learned to shoot it. I went bow hunting for the first time that year. I have said it before...lily feed deer are the best tasting around.

lily feed deer are the best tasting around.

GOOD FOR YOU!!!!!

I see some of my lillies were missing this morning, so I cut some, brought them in and put them in water. At least I will see a couple of them bloom.

This happens to some of my lilies most years as well, and I'm in the middle of the city -- definitely no deer. I was thinking squirrels, so tried the pepper spray. Seems to be working.

Yesterday i caught a chipmunk with a lilly bud in his cute little mouth. They cut the lillies to topple them, and then they eat the buds. Another possibilty. Around here chipmunks love lillies!

I dont know if you have them in the states, but here in the UK we have a beetle called the Red Lily Beetle.......... it causes damage to leaves and buds.

We do have them lauri- but in a limited geographical area. They came from the UK and arrived in Cambrige, MA in the nineties, and they spead from there. I am very familiar with them here, but my friends further west may not be.
Cindy

That looks like the deer damage I see on some of my lilies, hydrangea and hosta. Straight cuts where they bit them off cleanly.

I have never seen a chipmunk eat lillies. That is another reason to dislike those little buggers. I suppose they could cut off straight like that too.

I could not believe a deer could have done it - and I AM thinking chipmunks or rabbits on the ones fenced in - but - I lost all the Casa Blancas in the front. Totally gone. Not even a leaf left and then my neighbor sent me this pix of our mutual neighbor's yard.

I live in a fairly urban suburban area. Close in, no real forests left to speak of...

WOW!

Wow is right. Oh, those deer know a good thing when they see it. There is danger in the woods. Why not browse these nice salad bars.
I have been naming my deer, Lily, BS Susan, Daisy, Iris, etc. Won't work with your deer. Is that some nice fuzzy antler growth I see?
Lets name him....Dinner.

If it were chipmunks, would they eat the entire stem, or just the blossom at the end? You'd be surprised just how many deer are present in fairly urban environments.

Chipmunks don't eat the entire stem. They seem to dig under the bulbs or cut the lilly at the base. Or they climb the plant and just eat the buds. Deer seem to eat the whole top of the plant, from the ones I've seen.

I am growing some small oriental lilies outdoors. They are completely enclosed with window screening and aluminum flashing encircles them underground. One morning I find that something has cut of many of the stem. Not eaten the leaves noticeably but cut the stems off sometimes several inches above the soil level. This happened to me about 15 years ago with some lilies planted out in the open. At that time I thought that mice were doing it and was able to kill several. Mice , I believed had simply cut completely through LARGE lily stems and felled them as if using a chainsaw. After that I had no such problems for years until this year.
I immediately moved the pots (about 20) to a different area (again, fully enclosed) and replaced them with a mouse trap (both a live trap and a conventional spring trap). I also placed a chipmunk trap alongside and baited it with a small tomato. The next day there was no result with the traps but the pots that I had moved had no further damage. On the second day there was a dead mouse in my spring trap. Somehow that mouse had penetrated my defenses and caused a lot of damage by cutting down my lilies. This supported my theory that mice were responsible for the damage many years prior. I will redouble my efforts to eliminate mice from around my yard.