return to At Home > Garden & Landscaping

Sep 2011  |  By Jennifer Brennan, Horticulture Information Specialist, Chalet | Paid Advertisement  |  Comments

Select Spring Flowering Bulbs Now

This is the best time to purchase Spring flowering bulbs.

They are just arriving at your favorite garden center fresh from Holland. The selection is best and the bulbs are fresh. But don’t plant them now. Wait until the soil temperature drops in October.

Bulbs are “designed” to produce new roots every fall, after going dormant in the warm summer soils. The signal is the fall rainfall and the cooler soil temperatures. They do not flower this time of year because of a hormone that does not go away until the bulb is exposed to freezing temperatures over the winter months.

The simple rule to follow is to plant each bulb at a depth that is 4 times the diameter of the bulb. Make sure to use bulb fertilizer as bulbs are “heavy feeders”, needing nitrogen and phosphorous every fall and every spring as “building blocks” to make all the beautiful plant parts, including the roots and bulbs underground as well as the gorgeous flowers above ground.

Animal resistant bulbs include all the daffodils. Tulips are loved by many animals as well as humans, so protect them with your favorite animal repellent. For added display, look for types that have multiple stems (and flowers) per bulb, for multiple flowers. My favorite multi-flowered tulips are T.“Quebec”, T. praestans Fusilier, and T. praestans Unicum.