Hi Catherinet, I have a hardy Perry's giant sunburst. It was planted as a tuber by a guy that works on my pond. He planted it in a container that is 24" in diameter - not sure of the depth. But he said the pot was plenty big enough, and I could keep it in the same pot for several years. He planted it in black cow. He planted it in the early spring and it shot up leaves pretty quickly. The leaves stayed green and nice up until about a month ago and as I said started to turn brown around the edges. My pond man is here in the area only during the winter and spring and then heads back up north so I called him and he said maybe it was too hot - I have the container sunk into the soil and the area around it has little flat river stones. But I always heard lotus really like the heat. Anyway maybe some of this info will help you help me. Thanks.

Ellen, I geuss the biggest question is, how big will those plants get. Canna generally will grow between 3 and thirteen feet tall. Now, if your friend gave you giant canna, like Omega, they probably would have told you. You most likely have a standard, grows to about 4-5ft, or a dwarf, 3 ft plant. I think the biggest concern is the pot getting top heavy and being prone to be knocked over when the wind blows. If the canna are little crowded in the pot, they should be OK. I think canna us farely adaptable to being crowded, since that's how they propogate anyways. If I was in your shoes I'd let them grow and see what happens. If your pot gets too bushy, you can cut some plants to the ground level to thin the group. That won't hurt the canna anyways. I cut all of mine to the ground in the middle of last season and they all grew back and flowered again in the same season. Very hardy plants, the canna.

I'd leave them both alone. The bigger ones probably don't have quite as much new material to generate as the more closely trimmed plants do. The shorter trimmed plants are making a flush of new growth since they were trimmed shorter. I think they'll both end up equal by the end of the season. Most of the time lots of the foliage that the plant arrives with will dry up and fall off to be replaced by new growth within two months of planting anyway. Janet

A pic would be nice. Open up the paper towel... You should see little taproots emerging. If so, plant them. If they're stuck to the paper towel, cut around with scissors. Also, you want a moist, wrung out paper towel -- not wet. Kevin