There is another disease which, though not so devastating to the lily garden as the last, is yet very exasperating and even more fatal in its results.
Here is a beautiful strong growing Lilium Auratum, eight feet high, just showing its flower buds, and showing a large series of beautiful glossy leaves. Next week we notice that the lower two or three leaves are yellow and withered. Every day more and more leaves die, and eventually what was once a beautiful plant is now a naked stalk with a girdle of fallen yellow leaves and buds around it. Dig up the plant and examine its bulb and roots. The base of the bulb is gone! And its place is taken by a mass of evil-smelling pulp. Swarms of little thread-like worms will be seen twisting about all over the diseased portion. It seems natural to think that these worms are the cause of the evil, but we do not think that this is so. The worms are the result, not the cause of the disease.
Lilium Hookeri.
Lilium Auratum and L. Speciosum are the two lilies which mainly suffer from this disease, but other kinds are occasionally attacked. When once manifest, no treatment has any effect. Take up the plant as soon as you are certain that this disease has started, thoroughly wash the bulb in water, and let it soak in lime water for three days. Then thickly cover with powdered charcoal, and replant. If you do this the bulb may recover, and send up a good spike of blossoms next year. If you have bought good bulbs, and have planted them as we directed last month, you need not fear that you will lose many plants from this disease. Of one hundred and six lilies which we had in pots this year we have only lost one from this cause.
Yet another disease to irritate and discourage the lily grower! Look at this Lilium Humboldti. Its leaves are well developed, and it already shows five flower-buds, but on closer observation you will see that the stalks which support these buds are black and withered. Or see this L. Martagon, which shows a head of twenty blossoms. Touch these blossoms, or gently shake the stem, and five or six buds drop off! These buds, you will observe, have a black rotten base!
Lilium Roseum.
This disease is caused by three or four causes. If the bulbs have been planted in a poor or dry soil, or if the spot is unsuitable, you will lose many of your lilies from this cause. Bulbs which have not been properly ripened often disappoint you in this way. Again, if you delay planting your bulbs till February or March, you must expect to be treated in this way. But the most common cause of all is the presence of mildew among the scales. You can guard against this by paying attention to the methods described in our last number.
There are three other ways by which lilies may disappoint you. They may either not come up at all, or they may come out but fail to produce flowers, or they produce flowers which are damaged and are deformed or discoloured.