A few weeks before the last frost date is a perfect time to get the Canna lilies out of the basement and plant them. Canna lily is a tropical plant and can’t survive our winter, so they are stored in the basement during the winter. I used to pull them from the pots in autumn and store the bulbs in a box, but I’ve noticed that it’s easier to take out the bulbs and rhizomes if you leave them in pots over the winter. The soil dries completely during the winter and it can be scraped off the rhizomes. 

Taking Canna lily rhizomes apart is incredibly hard. They are very invasive, and in just one year they can take over the whole pot and even break it in half. This happened again this year. One of the pots has been broken by the force of the rhizomes. They can kill other plants in the pots, so I never plant them with any other plant, they are alone in the pot. I used to plant them in big buckets and pots, but they are incredibly hard to empty once the rhizomes spread, especially if the buckets are wooden. They can even stick roots through the cracks in the wood, and there is no way to get them out. Planting them out in the soil is also mission impossible, especially in the clay soil. As I said in the beginning, they can’t survive our winter and the rhizomes need to go out in the autumn. Getting them out of the wet clay in autumn is like pulling out a tree stump. Still, I love to see Canna lilies in the garden, so every year I plant them in smaller plastic pots, usually old ones so that there’s no real damage if they break a pot.

Canna lilies look really good once the plants grow their huge leaves, and I grow them mainly because of their leaves. The flower doesn’t matter much to me. Sure, it is pretty, but the plant looks wonderful even without it. I use them as a natural curtain in front of the garage to hide the firewood, and the growing collection of trash bins we have had since the “recycling at home” project started. The big leaves divert the view to themselves, and the mess behind them simply disappears.

This year I’ve used 6 pots, including the broken one, to plant my Canna lilies. The broken pot has been placed in the corner and won’t be moved, so it doesn’t matter that it broke. The rhizomes will take over the pot anyway and the soil will stay compact even if the pot breaks completely. I plant my Canna lilies in a mixture of old compost and a new one. They really don’t care what kind of soil they get. I used to naively plant them in quality compost and even feed them once a month until I realized that they don’t care what kind of soil they get. They will fill their pots and grow their big leaves even in really poor soil. I’ve divided the rhizomes into the pots and was still left with at least 20 rhizomes extra. The extra rhizomes were taken by my hubby’s coworkers, I really don’t have anywhere to plant them. 

The planted Canna will now start waking up, and in a couple of weeks, there will be a small forest next to the garage. The height and size of the plants will depend on the summer we’ll have. If the summer will be hot, the plants will be tall with smaller leaves, and if we get a colder one with lots of rain, the plants will be shorter but with huge leaves. Either way, they will look nice all lined together. Now, all we need to do is wait.