How to Grow Lily-of-the-Nile (Agapanthus)

Video Transcript

"Hi. This is Yolanda Vanveen from Vanveenbulbs.com. We're going to learn all about how to grow Agapanthus or Lily-of-the Nile. It's a beautiful sun flower or beautiful sun plant from South Africa. It grows really well in almost any climate. So, the Agapanthus is considered a bulb in the northwest, because it goes dormant in the winter. So, I sell it as a bulb. It's just a root and it has an eye, this is where the growth was coming up. So, I can turn around and dig it up and separate it from other bulbs or separate it from other parts of the Agapanthus very easily. So, as long as they meet, you can see where all the root meet, you can dig that back up and plant it again. When I plant it it's about three inches deep. So, don't plant it too deeply. Another trick I've learned with anything that has lots of blooms or anything that is rooty is they've got to be crowded to bloom. So, I would put at least three or four roots together almost touching. As you can see from this container there's probably fifty to a hundred starts in there and it's giving me two blooms that are almost done. It needs to be crowded to bloom. It loves to be crowded. So, the more crowded it is the happier it is. So, in order to get blooms quicker start with at least three to five in one area. So, if you put one by itself sometimes it takes two or three years to bloom. Don't be disappointed if they don't bloom the first year, because they have to have masses of roots to get lots of blooms. That's why you see them on the side of the road in California. There's just tons of blooms and there's tons of starts. They like to be crowded, so the key with them is to crowd them out to start and you'll get blooms much quicker. Put them in as much sun as you can put them in. They love hot, hot full sun. They do not do well in shade. They won't bloom in shade and they don't get hot enough. So, put them in as much heat as you can. But, saying that I do know a big group of Agapanthus near Portland that their right on the edge of a bridge and the house has got street on all four sides with some big pine trees. They're thriving. They're full shade, but they're thriving; tons and tons of blooms because they're crowded. They've been there a while. They've been got the heat. So, it's not really sun shade, its hot cold. So, put them in the hottest area you can find and they'll do really well. They bloom every summer. Hummingbirds love them and they're really easy, easy plants."