Since tropicals have tubers of small size - we will send you a sprouted tuber which vary in size from 0.5 inch to 1.5 inch.
A richly fragrant tropical water lily with over a hundred narrow violet-purple petals packed into a dense, star-like bloom, held well above the water on a sturdy stem and named, fittingly, for the old kingdom it comes from.
Origin of Name
The genus name Nymphaea traces back to the Greek nymphaia and, further still, to nymphē — "nymph" or "bride" — the water-dwelling maiden spirits of Greek mythology, a name ancient writers applied to floating river and pond flowers long before botany was a formal science. Carl Linnaeus formalized Nymphaea as a genus in his 1753 Species Plantarum, cementing the mythological name into modern botanical Latin.
The cultivar name 'King of Siam' is refreshingly straightforward by comparison: Siam was the official name of Thailand until 1939 (and again briefly from 1945–1948), so the name is a direct nod to the plant's Thai origins rather than a mythological or descriptive flourish — one of a handful of tropical water lily cultivars, alongside the naturally occurring Thai species Nymphaea siamensis, that wear the country's old name outright. Thailand has been a major center of ornamental water lily breeding for decades, and a name this regal suits a flower bred to be one of the showiest, most densely petaled tropical hybrids in general cultivation.
Origin of Plant
Nymphaea is a genuinely global genus, with roughly 65 wild species growing in still and slow-moving fresh water across the tropics and temperate zones of Asia, Africa, the Americas, and Europe. 'King of Siam' belongs to the tropical group within that genus, bred from warm-climate day-blooming species rather than the cold-hardy lines developed in 19th-century France. In the horticultural classification system water lily growers use to sort cultivars, it's coded "T/D" — Tropical, Day-blooming — as opposed to the Hardy or Night-blooming types, a shorthand that tells growers at a glance both how much cold it will tolerate and when to expect it to open.
Description
'King of Siam' produces one of the fullest flowers in the tropical water lily world: a dense, star-shaped bloom roughly 15 cm (6 in) across, built from over a hundred narrow violet-to-deep-purple petals — far more than a typical water lily, the result of stamens converting into extra petal tissue rather than remaining pollen-bearing structures. A cluster of golden-yellow stamens still shows at the center, and the bloom carries a notable fragrance, held on a sturdy stem roughly 20 cm above the water's surface rather than floating flush against it. Flowers open in the morning and close by evening, lasting three to four days before finishing, with the plant flowering prolifically from early summer through autumn. Leaves are rounded, dark green and flecked with brown, and the plant spreads generously across a pond surface, easily 1.2–1.5 meters (4–5 ft) wide given room. Because the flower's extra petals come at the expense of its reproductive parts, 'King of Siam' is sterile and sets no seed — it exists only as division-propagated clones, all genetically identical to the original cross.
Conservation Status
As a cultivated hybrid, 'King of Siam' has no individual conservation listing — it exists purely in the ornamental trade and, being sterile, cannot naturalize or spread by seed in the wild. It has in fact been recommended in California as a "better plant" alternative to genuinely invasive water plants for exactly this reason, though growers are still advised not to discard plant fragments into open waterways, since pieces of rhizome can root and spread vegetatively even without viable seed. The wider Nymphaea genus includes a handful of geographically restricted wild species under real conservation pressure, but this popular, easy-to-grow hybrid poses no such concern itself.
Care
Light: Full sun is essential — tropical water lilies need strong light to flower well, ideally 6 or more hours of direct sun daily, with light afternoon shade helpful only in the most extreme heat.
Water & Planting Depth: Grow in a planting basket set on the bottom of a pond or large water container, with the crown positioned roughly 20–60 cm (8–24 in) below the water surface. Still or gently moving water suits it best.
Soil: Heavy aquatic planting soil or garden loam in a mesh basket, topped with pea gravel to keep soil in place.
Temperature: A true tropical type — plant tubers once water reaches about 21°C (70°F), and expect no cold tolerance; in temperate climates, tubers should be lifted and stored indoors over winter or the plant grown as a seasonal annual.
Feeding & Maintenance: Feed every 2–3 weeks through the growing season with aquatic fertilizer tablets pushed into the soil near the roots. Deadhead spent blooms and remove yellowing leaves regularly to keep the plant tidy and encourage continued flowering.
An Interesting Note
Because 'King of Siam' is sterile, every plant sold under this name anywhere in the world is, genetically, the same individual — an identical clone traceable back through generations of division to whatever the original cross once was, with no seed-grown variation ever entering the picture. It's a small reminder that a flower this reliably spectacular from garden center to garden center didn't get that way by chance breeding again and again, but by one lucky, unrepeatable cross being propagated indefinitely rather than left to reproduce on its own.
