Description
Just like ‘Pink Grapefruit’ and ‘Colorado’ at first glance this lily belongs more with the “Pink” lilies than with the “Peach” lilies. However, it’s another Kirk Strawn hybrid that really is composed of shades of orange when you examine it with a computer color picker even though the overall effect is “pinkish.”
‘Starbright’ is perhaps our most free flowering water lily – it really is a flowering machine. It can’t rival ‘Fabiola’ first thing in spring when that variety is likely to have 5 or 6 or more flowers open at the same time. ‘Starbright’ rarely has more than 2 or 3 flowers open at the same time in our propagating tub (it likely would have more when grown in a large container or in an earthen bottom pond). But, unlike ‘Fabiola’ which slows down through the summer, ‘Starbright’ just keeps on cranking out flowers. It will almost never be without at least one flower open, and often have 2 or 3 open all summer long.
I don’t often mention foliage in these varietal descriptions – most lilies have quite similar foliage – the foliage of ‘Starbright’ though deserves mention – I even provide a couple of pictures of just the foliage in the photo “slideshow” below. The foliage is a deep, dark green, heavily mottled in purple. It’s by no means entirely unique, but there are few lilies that you really notice how attractive the foliage looks – that’s the case with ‘Starbright.’
