growing Calla lillies for wedding

21 years ago

We're having an outdoor wedding June 3rd of next year on the Eastern Shore of Maryland (near Delaware). The bride (our future daughter in law)would like large and small white and small yellow Callas at the outdoor wedding area as well as small white and small yellow on the tables (all in pots).

Buying plants already in bloom is financially not an option.

After reading the literature on the Internet the following is a plan that I would like commented on:

1) Purchase the tubers in the beginning of February. Plant them in pots with potting soils that are kept moist around the middle of February. Keep them near windows that face the south.

2)Around April start bringing the pots outdoors and bring indoors if temps ever get below 55. Keep plants in moist soil.

3) In May plant most of Callas in wedding area (some sun, some shade) but keep them in pots. This would be done so that it would be easy to bring them out in Fall. The remainder will be kept in pots, but unplanted, for use on tables. These could be put in ground and pulled out at wedding time.

4) Some Callas will be given away but some will be brought in at end of season to hibernate over winter. That process will be asked at later time.

QUESTIONS

1) Do you put one tuber per pot? Will this give enough flowers for pots to be put on tables?

2) Will they bloom sufficiently by June 3rd? This will be around ninety days or more from planting.

3) Will they have to be repotted during this process?

4) 3) How crazy is this plan?

5) I have read that some people keep Callas in ground over winter in our temperature conditions (10-20 at night during January and February) by planting them deeper (not in pots) and covering with mulch. Any comments?

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Comments (2)

cactusfreak
21 years ago
Someone on this thread did the same thing. You might want to eamil them for more directions.

Here is a link that might be useful: manipulating calla bloom time
wfordgardener
21 years ago
I would say your plan is pretty risky. I tried it this year for my daughter's June 25th wedding. I had several calla bulbs that I had planted several years ago in the ground that had been blooming reliably every May. (no special over-wintering precautions, but then, our winters here in north Texas are probably much milder than yours). Then, I planted a few every weekend for 5 or 6 weeks, beginning mid-March. Well, I think the only week I didn't have any callas in bloom from mid-May to mid-July was the week of my daughter's wedding! I had blooms before the wedding and blooms after but none for the ceremony! Luckily, we had arranged with a florist to get the bulk of the flowers....we were just hoping to have a few from the garden for sentimental reasons.

Check around with florists in your area. Since we were doing very simple arrangements for the bride and bridesmaids (three large callas wrapped with a ribbon for the bride, 1 for each bridesmaid) and on the tables (a single calla in a bud vase), we just ordered plain callas stems from the florist and added the ribbons ourselves. I think we ended up getting the giant callas for 2.75 a stem and the smaller ones for the tables for 10/$15....or something like that. We did find a large difference in pricing between florists, so call EVERYONE! You can also order them online from SAM's and online florists, but we wanted the security of having a local florist so that if something went wrong with getting the callas in, there'd be someone responsible who would make sure we had some kind of flowers!

I loved the callas for the wedding.....they are so elegant and simple....to me they're the perfect wedding flower.
Good luck and congratulations!
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