I have plecos in mine, they always eat the algae off the water lily stems, spent blooms, and the bottoms of the pads, but never actually eat the pads. I suppose they may be doing it, they are more active at night, and they do have bottomless pits, lol. How large are your plecos? Mine are about 8". I'd love to see a pic if you can post one? Do you have any other fish? Sometimes I see my Koi nibble at the lily pads.

Sounds like something has attack it's roots. If it's getting slimy, it's already done for. Was it attack by fungus? or was is exposed in alternately freeze and thaw cycles.. cells can be severely damaged by the extremes of winter?

I had some lilies in a container that looked like that - actually quite a bit worse - after the snails got to them. All the leaves nibbled down to just stubs. And bunnies could cause similar damage as well. At least yours managed to bloom! Mine never even made it up to the bud forming stage :-)

Carol, Since your front garden bed is in a somewhat straight row, you may find this technique to work for you as I have. I laid railroad ties In a straight line as a border at the back of my garden. I then laid a parallel line of railroad ties at the front edge of my garden. I then Stapled flexible netting available at your hardware store to the back ties, about 36 inches in width. To determine what length to cut each 3 foot strip of netting, I gently pulled it across that section of garden to the outer railroad tie and cut it there. You must allow enough room for it to gently sit over your plantings at their full growth height and a few more inches to overlap to place under the outer railroad tie. Do this along your stretch of garden. Each morning, you roll the netting back up to the tie in the back of the garden. In the evening you roll it over your plants and tuck under the outer railroad tie to secure it. Yes, you must repeat this each evening, but in my case, we had many deer who even came right up to our door. Yet for some reason, they would just put their nose up to the netting but never did anything else to try to get under it to the plants. I did this for many years in Kentucky with great success and did not have to replace the netting each year. I had tried everything from bone marrow to human hair cuttings to soap shavings to chemicals. The only thing that finally worked was the netting. Also good because water, air, and some sun can get through especially if you go away for the weekend. Good luck! I then stapled flexible netting found at a hardware store