No, I don't leave any stakes in the ground - I figure the freeze/thaw cycle would make them unstable anyway by the time the next growing season comes around, and would make it tough to do any spring maintenance with them still in the ground. I've never had a problem with hitting any bulbs - I don't place any stake that close to the stem, always a couple inches away. I have occasionally had to stake a 3-4 footer at bloom time, if it got crowded by taller lilies, and started to reach too much for the sun - flower would be heavy enough to fall all the way over.

I agreee with philomena, you don't need to leave anything in the ground. You have plenty of time once the bulbs come up to add stakes. I only stake ones over 3 feet that do not have any other taller periennals around as we occasionally get high wind with thunder storms. Sometimes I use a tomato cage if I'm lazy, but most lilies don't require staking. ---Faye in MD

Some lilies travel around underground before coming up. My "Siberia" does this the most of my Orientals (by up to 5") and there are stoloniferous species lilies that can travel a LONG distance from where the bulb was planted. (I've had up to 10" with Lankongense.) So I don't want to rely on the plant stalk to tell me where the bulb is.

I don't leave my stakes in the ground over the winter, instead I use plastic plant labels that I put on top of the planted bulb. (The bulb is 8" deep so the plant label won't spear it.) I'm less worried about spearing the bulb with garden stakes than I am about chopping them is half with a shovel while planting additional bulbs from one season to the next.

-Helen