Rescuing Canna Lilies in the Winter - Canna Drama in Zone 6

     This past summer was quite different from the summer before.   We had a very short growing season.  Spring came very late, with freezing temperatures in May.   We did have beautiful canna weather through the summer, with ample rain and sunny, hot weather.  But unlike the previous summer, where we did not get a killing frost until close to Thanksgiving, the frost hit during September, and the weather was generally cool, after that.

     A cool fall immediately after a killing frost presents a couple of problems.   First, it can be a motivational challenge to dig your canna lily rhizomes in the cold weather.  Washing the cannas in cold water on a cold day is not fun.   Second, after washing the rhizomes, the lack of warm weather is detrimental to drying and hardening of the canna rhizomes.   This increases the likelihood that you will develop mold on your rhizomes.   This happened to us, and we needed to throw out a few large clumps of rhizomes  before we could even store them.   We needed to dust the rhizomes with sulfur dust and hope for the best.

The Winter Canna Rescue
     Having lost several rhizome bunches, we proceeded to gradually dig up the rhizomes well into the winter, with the final lift occurring in January.   We stored the canna in the garage and we really have no idea if any of these would survive.   I recorded the rescue and will be posting it on youtube.com/MyBackyardScience   If you are interested in the dig and the results, please check out the channel, and subscribe with notifications in order to get notified of the updates.

Collecting or Harvesting Canna Lily Seeds - Growing Canna as a House Plant MyBackYardScience

This video shows how to collect or harvest canna lily seeds to be used to grow for the next season. Note that not all types of canna yield seeds that will germinate. From my experience and research, seeds from most hybrid varieties that have been bred for certain characteristics will not germinate. Only what is considered standard or wild varieties will produce new plants from seeds. My guess is that this is intentional to protect the investment of the breed owner, but I'm not sure of this. However, the hybrid plants may produce plentiful new plants by lifting and splitting the rhizomes ( I'll have another video for that). Rhizomes are like an underground stem that spreads and produces new sprouts for the plant. These also store energy produce "eyes" that will sprout new plants in the spring. I am not a gardening expert. I'm sharing my experience in gardening. The things I describe worked for me and I can not guarantee they will for everyone. That is the beauty of growing canna lilies. They are the perfect plant for the person with a "brown thumb". You can get amazing results with very little knowledge and care. I would love to hear feedback from anyone with expertise or differing experience - please comment. For reference, we are in growing zone 6. Canna Lilies are not considered hardy in zone 6, meaning they likely will not survive the winter and grow back in the spring. That does not mean that all will perish. For me, some cannas that were located near the house foundation grew back in the spring. This is probably because the heat loss through the foundation kept the soil from freezing. These areas were also long existing planting areas, so the soil quality in these areas probably drains better than other planting areas on the property. This would help reduce the likelihood of rot.