Hello, I'm new here, and somewhat new to lilies. Two years ago I planted an Oriental lily called The Edge. It's first year it was spectacular! Huge white blooms with a wide, dark pink/lavender edge. This year, as sure as the sky is blue, the blossoms are pure white. At first I thought maybe I got it mixed up with Casablanca, but Casablanca is planted on the other side of the garden, and it's blooms are quite a bit larger. The actual stalk, number of and size of blossoms is fine, it's the total lack of color which has caught me off guard. I've never seen a lily do this! Could this be a problem with the soil, or possibly some genetic issue? Happy to post pictures if anyone want to see....

Pictures and area where you live would help. But maybe the sun faded them

Are you having a hot summer? I have grown other "pink edged" lilies that show the color best in cooler weather. I haven't grown The Edge so can only comment in a general manner.

The picture on top is what they looked like last summer, the picture on the bottom is what they look like now. They only just started opening yesterday. Aside from the total lack of color, they appear to be healthy. It hasn't been any hotter than the usual summer heat we get. With that said, we did get five consecutive weeks of rain in the spring..... no kidding, it rained every single day for five weeks! We live in northern Virginia, in zone 7a

I think those are two different cultivars. Look at the wavey, somewhat ruffled petals of the second one compared to the first one. Also check out the color of the stigma. The first one, 'The Edge', has a green stigma and the white one has a purple stigma. Two pieces of evidence that they are not the same cultivar.

Well I take that back. According to the Lily Register 'The Edge' should have a purple stigma. It is not showing well in your photograph. It also says the margins of the petals are "slightly ruffled to ruffled".

This might be a a better picture from last year, it was taken just the day after it opened. The picture above from last year was when the bloom was a few days old.

I assure you it's The Edge, and not another cultivator. I little back history; I originally picked up The Edge, along with Robina, Casablanca and Stargazer from a vendor at the Philadelphia Flower Show in the spring of 2015. Since I needed to clear out a space to plant them, I planted some of them in large pots on the my deck, pictured here. You can see The Edge in the upper left, along with Stargazer and Casablanca.



Later, I transplanted them to their new bed, while most of them were still blooming, this since I wasn't sure if they would survive wintering in a pot. I planted The Edge to the left of Robina, which had already spent it's blooms. You can clearly see The Edge still in bloom, with Casablanca to to the far right.



This year everything came up and is in good shape, except for the fact that The Edge is white. I know it's not Casablanca, because the flowers are too small, and Casablanca is probably still a week away from opening.

You got me stumped.

Well now you did it, got me sharing pictures . JUST took this one of a not quite opened The Edge. Yup, the stigma is most definitely purple, which is the only thing that's purple....LOL!


Here's our Lily Garden this year. The real tall ones in the middle are what's left of Robina, which shot up to 6.5 feet tall in it's second year! That one has been a real pleasure!

The pink edge/coloring is apparently over a white base. The degree of pink and rose edging development is quite dependent on cool nighttime temperatures starting about two weeks before and leading up to bud opening. If nighttime temperatures are very warm, they can literally reduce edging like that to just a hint of color, or in some cases, no edging at all. A classic example of this is cultivar Tropical Isle which during warm nights leading up to bloom will not have that pretty rose edge. Another would be Saltarello which won't develop a peach blush. There may be other factors that I don't know about, but I'll hang my hat on the warm nights. Watch to see what happens next year with your 'Edge'. I'll ask around also.

So far we are having an overall cool June and July. My lily colors have been fantastic! Tropical Isle was particularly colorful with its pink edge. Even my tet trumpet seedling S-10 grown from David Sim's seed was nice, especially on the reverse.

Roosterlorn said:The pink edge/coloring is apparently over a white base. The degree of pink and rose edging development is quite dependent on cool nighttime temperatures starting about two weeks before and leading up to bud opening. If nighttime temperatures are very warm, they can literally reduce edging like that to just a hint of color, or in some cases, no edging at all. A classic example of this is cultivar Tropical Isle which during warm nights leading up to bloom will not have that pretty rose edge. Another would be Saltarello which won't develop a peach blush. There may be other factors that I don't know about, but I'll hang my hat on the warm nights. Watch to see what happens next year with your 'Edge'. I'll ask around also.

This is an interesting theory. Up until just a couple of weeks ago, we've had a pretty moderate summer. As soon as July arrived so did our more typical hot and humid summer weather with daytime highs in the mid 90's and high humidity. It's not unusual for our evening's to hover around the mid 70's to 80 degrees. Last year was very mild, and it also seemed ALL of our plants bloomed earlier with longer lasting blossoms. The lilies this year are blooming about 2-3 weeks behind where they were last year, and the blooms just aren't lasting as long, with the exception of Robina.....she is my angel-princess

Connie, I was out this evening checking one of my Tropical Isles which is about to open, just for that very reason: to get a peak on how much rose edge I'll get----because we've had some really warm nights, some holding in the low to mid 80's. As you can see, not much there. And look how dark the reverse got this year from all that sun.

Just took these of TI:





My buds are pretty dark; we had a fair amount of cool sun up to several days ago and now we are getting a little rain. Unusual for this time of year here.

2Whippets, I want to continue our discussion on this tomorrow. I know you'll find what I'm going to talk about real interesting so hang tight but right now, between the NALS Convention and my wife's sister in laws 200 plus family reunion both over the week end, I pooped.

Roosterlorn said:2Whippets, I want to continue our discussion on this tomorrow. I know you'll find what I'm going to talk about real interesting so hang tight but right now, between the NALS Convention and my wife's sister in laws 200 plus family reunion both over the week end, I pooped.

Can't wait! Ya'll are so friendly, thanks for your time!

... and welcome to NGA, especially to the Liliums forum, Elaine!

Lily people are the best!

Two opened today which show just the slightest (look close) hint of color on a couple of petals edges; the remainder that have opened remain completely white. I have hope that this is just a weather/temperature situation and not something more insidious. It also occurred to me today that most of our lilies are planted against a heat radiating brick wall. I have to wonder, based Roosterlorn's suggestion regarding temperature, if where they are planted could be a contributing factor? Essentially, I'm wondering if I might have created a micro-climate which might be working against me?