Solutions For Past Blooming Bulbs

I saw leagardener in Kansas mention something about saving Tulip bulbs, but he didn't go into detail unless it's buried in some other thread.

Question: Can I pull the Tulips that are past blooming and just save them for a few weeks then cut the foliage off?

If I understand it right they need some time to replenish the bulb through the leaves.

How about Daffodils? I have so many stalks where I'd like to plant summer stuff but they're in the way. How long till I can cut them back?

Or just live with it?

That is the major drawback for Daffs, the foliage hangs on for a while, and unfortunately it needs to remain to ensure blooms next year. A former member had advised me a few years ago that after a certain number of weeks Daff foliage can be mowed, but I can't for the life of me find it. All the web searches I've done result in "leave them till they die off naturally". I remember mowing after the advised time allowance that year, and had good rebloom- I'll do some searching and see if I can find it.

Thanks for your help Gem!

The answer to your tulip questions is yes - I've done it for years. You can pull them up, leaving the foliage intact, and then come back later once it has faded and cut it off. An advantage to this is that the bulbs are drier. Then I put the bulbs in the paper bags people put their lunch in, or on any flat surface if they are still damp (don't want rot) and then put them in the ground in fall. I get displays of hundreds of old bulbs this way.

Donna

Donna - Do you dig up the tulips right after flowering and leave them bare root with the foliage on? Or do you replant them in a pot until the foliage dies? I used your method last summer. I waited until the foliage had died though, then I dug them up and stored them in a paper bag in my basement. I replanted in the fall and today I have beautiful tulips blooming. They never would have come back 100% if I had left them in the ground. I highly recommend this method to anyone who wants to save tulips other than Darwin Hybrids. I have good luck with those and some of the smaller tulips, Kaufmania, Gregeii leaving them in the ground, but for all others, dig them up!

My tulip beds always have seed from the previous year- verbena bonariensis, nicotiana alata, four o'clocks - so they need to come out so the seed can come in, but not right away. I have glads that I overwinter in my basement that go into two of my tulip places, so I need the room.

I don't dig them up right away, though. I let them go until the foliage is starting to yellow. Some foliage ripens really quickly and I can take it out within a short time after blooming, cut off the foliage and store. For those on which it ripens more slowly, I put on flat surfaces in my garage to dry out a bit, then cut off the foliage and put them in paper lunch bags in my garage. I've never taken them to what is certainly the cooler environment of my basement, mostly because it is tough to make sure there are no worms or bugs on them, but I bet that's good for them.

Some foliage ripens really fast, and I take it out shortly after bloom. If the foliage remains really green (more common with glads) I'll pot them in soil in the corner of my garage until they mature more. I haven't had to buy glads in five years, and I get more every time. Some are really good at multiplying, like Matchpoint and Good News.

I actually dig my Kaufmania and Greigii too, but I always miss some, and they come back well.

I really love that more people are doing this. No one who lives around me does and I can see they think I'm nuts and its too much work, but it is a great way to get outstanding and increasing displays year after year for very little money. Instead of spending hundreds on bulbs I might buy $25 worth.

I'm with you! Dig 'em up!

Donna

I dug a bunch up...about 100 of them...about 50 to go. I just wrapped them all together with duct tape marking which ones are what. I'll wait till they dry out a bit and cut the foliage off.

We'll see what happens next year.

For Daffodils the number I've seen is 42 days from the end of flowering. On mine the foliage seems to be dying down by them anyway.

Has anyone tried this with hyacinths?

I'd love the answer to that question.

As for hyacinths, I don't have any problem getting them to return year after year. Sometimes they get smaller, but I think the bulb has divided and I think if I wait another year or two, they get larger again. That may be my imagination, however. I'll have to take more photos every year.

Very interesting.

DM, so tell me please, how does the tulip bulb replenish itself if it's out of the ground? It seems like it would need to be planted to get fat again, no?

Last year I read some scholarly research about daff foliage and it said that they think 6 weeks is about right, and maybe up to eight. That 's the timing i use. It seems like a very long 6 weeks though!

Ah, as long as you leave the foliage intact to ripen they will be fine. Tulips are from dry places, so I think the issue is not being dry but having their food supply taken away. I do like to give my replanted bulbs (some have which have been replanted half a dozen times) some liquid fertilizer to help them along as they ripen. I remember reading a blurb on Brent & Becky's web site that if your daffs really need digging up and you don't want to do it, give them gertilizer (I use a 10-15-10 liquid for fast action) before, during and after bloom. So I gave them, and my aging tulips, a dose as they were coming out of the ground and right before bloom.

Interestingly enough, after storing them, I pull them out in fall for replanting, only to find that between harvest and replanting they have formed offsets. Some of them are bigger. Some have an offset that is 50% of the size of the original bulb, all while out of the ground with the foliage intact.

I find getting daffs out of the ground a major pain, since I adhered to textbook when I put them in. I finally hauled some of my Mt. Hoods out and moved them elsewhere, and I noticed that the flowers seem larger as a result.

Whoops, I should have addressed this to Tabasco.

This message was edited May 1, 2010 1:49 PM

Thanks, Donna. That information is good to know.

I know about the daffs, I am dreading digging up my Salome daffs to separate and replant (somewhere else since the spot was ill chosen). I made the mistake of planting about 150 of them through out my perennial bed. Not a good thing.

Thanks for the tip about pulling and replanting tulips in the fall, I had bought and planted some last fall, they bloomed and are beautiful but I was feeling sad and a little wasteful thinking they could only be a one time bloom....so I'm going to give your idea a try Donna Mack and Cindyeo... just curious... what did you mean by the daffodils being so hard to dig up since planted by the textbook? meganemelia

Oh, sorry Megan, I should explain. I planted them really deeply. At least six inches down. I had huge bulbs, and put them in twice the depth of those bulbs. Getting them out was like going through torture . I understand now that it was unnecessary, but I can be rather anal "oh, it says to stand on your head so I guess I'd better stand on my head..."

Tabasco, I fear that is going to be a chore. They must look lovely in your perennial beds. If you use a fork to lift them you might be able to better keep all of your perennials intact.

Thanks DonnaMack...I have planted some of mine very deep too, some of my daffs have shorter stems than others of the same variety, do you think this means I planted them too deep? I can get carried away following the directions too, when I find myself getting too hung up on worrying if i've done it right, and reading and rereading each step. In fact I have taken notes on your method of removing the bulbs and so forth!

I think Tulips must do a lot of the replenishing of the bulbs before and during bloom, kinda how Lilies seem to. They're in the same family, which may explain that similarity. When I've broken a Lily stem off to the ground shortly before or during bloom, they typically bloom fine the next year.

Hi Megan,

I KNOW that I get carried away. But I also think that some of the information is related to soil that is not like mine. I would assume that in rockier or sandier soil it is best to put bulbs deeper - but when you have heavily amended clay like mine it isn't necessary.

My thought is that it is difficult to truly plant daffodils, in particular, too deeply. I just don't think it's NECESSARY to send them halfway to China. I don't think my Mount Hoods needed to be planted six inches deep.

But the other question is - did you get your daffs from more than one source? Some company's bulbs come roaring out of the ground and you need to step out of the way (Old House Gardens). Some are a bit smaller and modestly priced and take an extra year, perhaps two, to roar (McClure and Zimmerman). I ordered Vie en Rose from two different companies (one A rated and one formerly A rated) and there was a significant difference in first year bloom. The ones from the formerly A rated company were better at the same period in time.

I am thrilled that I have gotten to the point where my ten years of recording what has worked and what does not is useful to other people. Thank you for telling me.

Fisher,
Thanks for the tip about the duct tape, I knew there were more than 1,000 ways to use it. That makes 1,001.

Question for anyone who digs up theirs...What do you do w/ the little tiny ones that are not connected to a larger one. Usually if they are still hanging on to a larger one I leave it until it is a bit larger, but I often have a bunch that are not connected to anything. Most of these do have a small leaf that is still intact. If the leaf breaks off I just stick it back in the ground and hope for the best.

Also, they seem to sink if I don't dig them up every year. I just dug up a bunch today and I know I only planted them at 4" and some were down about 8". My daffodils don't seem to sink though. One of my neighbors has the same problem w/ tulips. I don't want to do the basket thing since they are planted amongst other plants and I can't just put them in a set square or rectangle.

Any thoughts?
Thanks

Onyxwar (wow, great handle!)

The question of keeping what I call the ittie bitties is a judgment/eyeball call. If you have lots of room and can give them compost and fertilizer to beef them up hey, why not keep them, but if they are really tiny I'll toss them. I was particularly doing the toss with gladiolus bulbs, but last year I noticed that I had missed quite a few and they were sending up foliage (which at first I didn't recognize as glad foliage). Some of the bulbs attached to them were of a size that might bloom in a year or two, so I kept them.

I have noticed that species tulip (which I do dig up) will have tiny bulblets that end up flowering the next year. I put in 10 turkestanicas, dug up 19, and the following fall had 25.

So, perhaps you might want to toss the tinies on bulbs that do not tend to come back well, and keep some of those that do.

Does this help at all, or am I simply confusing you?

Donna

That makes since. I will toss the really tiny ones and keep the ones that have foliage.
Right?

Cool! Sounds like a good plan.

2 years ago I read about doing something like this from another DG person. She waits for a month after her tulips have stopped blooming, digs them up and puts in her Dahlias where the tulips had been.

This did not work out so well for me last year. I waited a month, put in the Dahlias, but the dahlias were very late to bloom. I still have some tulips blooming right now, so that means I won't get the dahlias in till Mid-June. I had been thinking of doing just what you described Donna ... digging the tulips up, potting them and putting them to the side. Glad to hear that it works well!

May 15 is our last frost date, so I will be out digging up the tulips and putting them in pots to put off to the side for a while. :o)

I do this with gladioluses, and I think it works because glads are just fine going in much later in the year.

Toofewanimals - another great handle!

Wow what great information from all! Thanks soooo much!
I planted my first bulb garden with about 150 bulbs. One of my gardens consisted of many shades of pinks, purples, and lavenders in memory of Susan G Komen, as I am a breast cancer survivor...My friend told me that they would never come up as I had to keep the deer and the voles (that have invaded my yard), from eating them. I was determined to "get it right" and have these bloom. Well I am happy to say the blooms were so beautiful that my neighbors came over to see them...even "the Jones" who live across the street!
My trick was to use several methods to deter these little rascals...I bought a product "Sweeney's" (in Kmart) which I sprayed on and soaked the ground through after I had planted them in the Fall. It is bitter to the rodent and deters them from eating the bulb. I had later read that I also could have planted the bulbs with some pea gravel as the voles hate to dig through gravel. I purchased solar sound deterrents from a catalog which I placed out in the early spring to deter the deer. I later sprinkled "Shot Gun" which I believe is a form of coyote urine?? What ever it is it worked.
So now I was worried about how to save these gorgeous bulbs since my friend said, "You know that Martha Stewart refers to tulips as annuals." :) Now I don't have to worry, thanks to all your wonderful info!

Way to go Flowerlady! You didn't let anyone deter you, and of course you were right. And you fought off deer, which is a MAJOR accomplishment. I would not have known how.

You did the multiple method thing. I had invasion problems with voles and rabbits but used a taste deterrent, as you did, with the gravel method (Volblok) which you did, and threw in miniature daffodils. I also use Bonide's Shotgun. The deterent is Thiram, a horticultural fungicide. Rabbits can't stand the taste or, apparently, the smell.

Bravo!

Thank you DonnaMack.

It has been a tough fight keeping the voles away...they are very prolific this year as no other year before. My neighbors don't complain that they have them because they are all living in my yard making a mess of my lawn!

I have roses and hostas still in their containers as I needed to buy more vole deterrent before I planted them as voles also love roses and hostas, besides bulbs. They keep moving from one area of the yard to another, so I am now adding the deterrent to the hole along with the pea gravel to save them from those gnawing little critters, because it is getting quite expensive buying all this deterrent. I read one thread re: voles where one woman was crying as she was writing because all her hard work of 5 yrs had been ravaged by voles. Her story helped me to go out and get armed to fight these critters!

:) I do have 3 cats that track some down and bring them into my kitchen or leave them on the front steps, to show me what a good kitty they are! Best deterrent ever!

I usually dig my tulips and some of the daffodils every year and let them dry out over the summer/fall then replant. The main reason I do it is to control weeds, and also we sometimes get too much rain.
I save all sizes of bulbs and sort them by size and replant the same size together. So you would have an area or row of tiny babies that will just grow for a year or two.

Hello caitlinsgarden. I dig up my tulips every year and dry them out as well. I actually separate them by type if I grow a specific tulip by itself (pinnochio) or by location (peony bed). I dry them in the garage and then put them in those brown paper bags people used to carry their lunch in, labelling the bags. Often they form offsets during the summer so I have more in the fall. It also is, as I know you've found, very economical!

Donna

RE: The tulips shown in my pic above. I forgot about them for two months where they got awfully wet. Stalks and all just laid on a bench under a porch that did get rain water run-off. After deciding I should do something with them, all were divided (first year bulbs planted Nov '09) just by pulling therm apart, dried out, then placed in a large bag with peat moss.

Question: Only a few had rotted before bagging them, but I'm wondering if they were separated too soon?





This message was edited Oct 5, 2010 7:46 AM

I don't believe it was too soon. Typically the foliage dies off quickly and they can be divided upon digging. Just make sure the peat is completely dry to avoid further rot issues.

Thanks, somehow the peat did get wet or damp. I do have some healthy bulbs but they seem quite small. I guess they won't grow as tall as the originals?

Pics of bulbs...

They look to be blooming sized, but you're right, probably a bit shorter with more variation in size of blooms than the first year. I kinda like the look better the 2nd year when there are various heights and sized blooms, more graceful than all being such exact matches. Looks like those bulbs have started rooting, probably a good idea to get them in the ground pretty quickly.

I am so glad you posted more on this, I almost forgot about my bulbs and I need to plant them really soon.

onyx ... you are too funny ... I just got mine planted yesterday ... along with just a couple new ones. :-0

Still haven't gotten mine in the ground yet...maybe next weekend. If not I am going to be in big trouble!

Onyx, you've got plenty of time! You can plant as long as the ground isn't frozen. I still have a few more bulbs to plant too.

I got about 1/2 done this morning. I got some help from my little ones. They did a great job at putting the points up and then stomping the ground firm. Since none are over 40lbs I didn't worry about the ground getting too compacted. We did about 100 total. We planted the tulips and daffs.

On the original subject...
This year I stored my bulbs in the garage instead of the basement and only lost a few to rot, in the basement I loose at least a dozen or so. I think I will be keeping them in the garage from now on.

All done. Plenty of small ones in a large bag. It should be interesting to see how they come up with different sized bulbs. Kind of like a cascading look.

Thanks