Here is my bulb story, all eaten by critters. Then cage building trials. Last cage pictured is a great success. Lilies untouched, multiplied and more beautiful this year. Click on link below.

Everything I have read, voles get through 1/2" holes to eat bulbs, but if you already have the material I'd probably give it a try.

Bulb cage for lilies

Pandora, read your link and studied the picture. It looks like your cages are totally closed boxes, which means the bulb foliage is able to fit through the openings with no problem. You also raised another hazard, though - chipmunks eating the new foliage above ground! It hardly seems worth the effort! Floral, you suggest large cages, but that means digging very large deep holes. If trenches, the bulbs will line up like soldiers. Oh why oh why did I order all these lilies!! I'm having a wedding here on August 4 and wanted to have something in bloom...

Just because the cage is a cuboid the bulbs don’t have to be in rows inside it. It’s just that straight sided shapes would be easier to make out of stiff mesh. The hole wouldn’t need to be any deeper than the hole you’d make for the bulbs without a cage. Do you have too many lilies to put them in pots? I didn’t realise that you were planting lilies. I had imagined smaller bulbs like tulips or daffodils.

I’m very glad I don’t have these problems. Good luck.

My bulbs are supposed to be planted up to 8 inches deep and 12 inches apart so that really doesn't lend itself to a group box, especially in a border with other things. My concern with my method is whether a lily stem is slim enough to grow as it should through a 1/2 inch opening, and also whether sharp edges could tear it. (I suppose the stem would just grow around a sharp wire it encountered?) I would never bother doing this with tulips that have to be dug up every year, but it seemed worth the effort for lilies that should last for years. Floral you are indeed lucky to not have to think about voles or their ilk!

Lilies are excellent for pot culture. Plant them in 3s in deep terracotta (or anything, really) and cover the top with fine mesh. When the foliage starts to emerge, remove the mesh and use horticultural lightweight fleece (i do this to keep slugs and snails off my plants). Leave the fleece until the foliage is a good 6-9inches (when you will need to keep an eye open for lily-beetles) The fleece is light enough to protect the emerging leafage without distorting it. The lilies will be happy in pots for years with just a little topdressing in spring. You can sink the pots in the ground (black plastic better than clay if doing this) and lift when blooming is over, if growing in a border situation - I do this all the time, swapping out seasonal bulbs,.

OK, now I want to learn more about potting them. I I don't want to add a new watering duty to my regime so I have been cutting back on containers in general. I also am lacking in cool storage areas to overwinter much more than I am now. But it would be easier to sink plastic pots in borders than these pesky mesh cages.

Kit, you did not read to the end of my link. I made removal tops on second version.

If you sink the pots, you may consider using 2 pots. Dig hole & bury a pot, leaving rim up about an inch or 2 to deter voles. Voles do not like to be above surface much. Then plant the bulbs in slightly smaller pot that just slides into the permanent one. That way you could even easily change out the inner pot with annuals or later blooming lilies after the lilies start to die back. No extra digging. Over winter you might consider laying a piece of wire mesh on top of the pots. I was planning on trying that next year myself.

Kit, also about my first attempt with closed cages, I explained that many lilies did not grow through my small mesh. Lilies form a cluster at the top of the stem fairly early, not a thin pointy stem. That is why I went to a removable top. For my purpose I am very happy with that last cages pictured. My bulbs are about 3" apart and 2 layers with offset so no bulb is on top of another. I gives a really full look. It may not be the look you are going for.

The liilies all went in the ground in pots with rims an inch above the surface and a sheet of 1/2 inch mess on top. Thinking ahead to when I replace the mesh with cloth, per Campanula's instructions, is horticultural fleece necessary or will a porous fabric do?