Bulbs: Messy looking foliage, 1 by tabasco

tabasco wrote:
Oh, baa, the pot idea is very ingeneous. Hadn't heard that before but this fall I will try it in my more prominent beds...

Zone5girl, I am struggling with the same issue in my front yard...so here's the results of my research...

--one classic solution is to companion plant with daylilies whose leaves will disguise the post season bulbs... let's see, also hostas and liriope in shade/part shade... and also shallow rooted perennials such as astilbe......somebody else probably knows other combination 'cover up' plantings, there must be lots...

I also read somewhere that you don't have to wait until the tops turn completely brown, just 'start' to turn brown and fall over, if you want most of your daffs to return. Some say that is around 6 weeks after bloom.

If you don't mind a smaller percentage returning, cut them off earlier...I read this approach for the 'impatient' in research from one of the Extension services...I'll see if I can find it again and post it...If I recall correctly, at 4 weeks something like 85 percent returned in the experiment... That's not too big a loss if the droopy foliage is really getting on your nerves and messing up your perennial bed!

There is also the braiding and wiring of the leaves together, which many advise not to do, but I think it looks quite quaint and elegant (some would say only a repressed and 'twisted' gardener would like that approach!). I would bet this technique, while not optimum, couldn't be that detrimental to the perennializing process...

If we did our own experiments I think chances are we would find that there is very little difference between cutting them early/braiding them and leaving them floppy for full term. But the true daffodil nurturer would probably cringe at that!

Well, we cut our off yesterday, so it's too late for us to experiment, but maybe next year... ;-) t.

p.s., even though the leaves are driving me crazy, I still love daffodils!