Well, with much anxiety, it's done. I did not find a big mass of the corm, in fact, it was about 4" long, and running horizontal behind the crown, which was in perfect condition. I didn't mess with it too much, but I did go up a size to the larger dishpan, mostly because the roots were HUGE- like baby carrot size-not a mass of little root, but there were small ones only on the very bottom of the pan.
Something interesting though. I started to wrap the pond tablets last year, in a single layer from a paper towel, because I though it would keep the white film off the top of the pads- and it has, but there were about 6 of them, still wrapped, and big roots clinging to them. The tablets were still intact, and soft, so if you consider that I give it a tab about every 2 weeks, it has not consumed a lot of them in the recent past. I'm not sure how I feel about that, but it has never not had an open bloom, and has always had at least 4 coming up. Maybe it was because of the cooler weather, or because I never stopped feeding it through the winter, since the pond was heated. I removed all of them, and only replaced 2 tabs.
Here it is, and I had to prop up the open bloom today....there are a few buds that I hope will make it. One was kind of laying over, but has perked back up, but the larger one has not....
And a beautiful lemon mist today, and I am so excited, there are 6 more on the way. That one lemon mist is now five separate lilies, and all but one have two blooms on them. Last year, the blooms were few and far between.
And a shot of the whole pond today;
Now, we wait to see if it will be the same excellent bloomer that it was....I hope so.
Have a great Mother's Day all. Thanks to all who contributed to this topic!
I'm cracking a beer!