Can I do bulbs now?

I received some crocus corms in little pots from a wedding and they were sprouting, but now don't look so good. Its past crocus time here, but I want to get them in the ground so they will bloom next spring. Also, I am seeing some tulips that are coming up getting run over by the expanding hydrangea and would like to move them as well. Do I have to wait for fall to do these things? Thanks for the help!

I'd put the crocus in the ground now, and hope for the best for next year. For the tulips, wait until the leaves have started to wilt for this year to move them.

Most shrubs and in fact most plants prefer to be moved when they are dormant....that would be late fall or very early spring.

I put the crocus in today.. some of them definitely didn't look good, with mold on them. Others still looked ok with sprouts starting. Do you think the moldy ones are a lost cause? I put them in anyway just in case. I will wait on the tulips. Thank you!

I have moved bulbs after all flowering is done but before the foliage has died. Of course, the best thing for the bulb is to deadhead so the plant doesn't put energy into producing seed, fertilize at the time of deadheading, then let it keep all the foliage for photosynthesis until the last bit of green is gone, and wait til late summer or early fall to transplant. And I have recently figured out that it's smart to mark the spot before the dead foliage disappears, and 8" pieces of bamboo stuck around the clump with just a couple inches of bamboo sticking up are a good way for the gardener to know where bulbs are located.

All that being said, if you need to move bulbs after they've flowered and been deadheaded, but before the foliage is dead: Carefully dig the clump up, taking care not to tear the roots or foliage. Make a new planting hole, adding fertilizer to the loosened soil at the bottom of the hole, and try to make the bottom of the hole be the right height so the green part of the foliage will be above ground and the white part below ground, i.e. you want each bulb to be planted at the same depth it was before. Sometimes some of the bulbs were lower than others, so the bottom of your planting hole may need to be sloped. Try to have one or more assistants who can hold the green foliage of each bulb upright as you carefully fill the hole with fluffy soil or amended soil; this is the tricky part! The foliage of the bulbs I've moved wasn't stiff, so all the individual blades want to flop every which way, and my husband and I between the two of us only have 4 hands. You will end up with a clump of foliage which is floppy or lays on the ground. Hopefully the blades which lay on the ground are not on top of each other; you want each one to still be able to get sun. (Tulip foliage may be stiffer, but I haven't planted them in quite a few years so can't say.)

If you have a cutting garden or service garden as a temporary place, and are willing to do a two-step process, you can more properly heel each bulb in by planting in a row, in a trough, and each bulb's foliage flops off to the same side. Mark the location of each bulb, and then after the foliage has died off, you can lift the bulbs out of the unsightly trench and replant into a nice clump in your display garden.

By the way, just in case you were not already aware, bulbs really do benefit from being fertilized. Use a fertilizer specially formulated for bulbs if you have the $ and storage space for a specialized product. (I use Espoma Bulb-Tone.) Fertilize when the shoots first appear in spring, and again after flowering is finished, when the clump is all deadheaded. I've noticed much better flowering when I've been faithful with fertilizing. And crocuses, daffodils, chionodoxas, squills, and some others, will multiply, so fertilizing them means you are helping the multiply; the clumps will grow and can eventually be divided.

Crocuses seem to spread and also to self-sow away from the original clump, so even if just a few of yours live, they are worth trying to save.

To develop your strongest bulbs pinch off the flower and or the forming seed head and permit the green leaves to put all energy into the bulb. For the absolute best bulbs give the leaves a chance to go down and be brown. Any action that takes away the sun from the leaves is working the wrong direction. Many old timers tie up the green post flowering leaves. Many deadheaded. These practices were and remain to be wrong. It creates a damp high humidity zone subject to disease and blocks the energy from the sun from getting to the suface of the leaf. Wait until they are down and brown....then move them.

Dig and replant the bulbs at the bulb companies suggested debth not like you or someone else may have planted them at the wrong debth in the first place. Rule of thumb.....plant them down in the soil three times the length of the bulb. Just because some bloomed is not reason to think they are planted at the right debth. Planted properly they will bloom bigger, better and for a much longer time between division and replanting.

My bulbs...thousands are in permanently mulched beds. Most have been untouched since planting them some twenty to thirty five years or more years ago. The only digging I did was to expand the number and size of the beds. They and I are in our twilight years. I will not work them again. Because of that the bloom will be somewhat smaller and less in number but they will not likely die out. There are known beds untouched and sill blooming that are fifty years old. The deer have eaten all the tulips. I have never fertilized these bulbs except when making the original beds. At that time they got fertilized with a low number organic like 4 - 2 - 4 as made by Fertrell. Flowers do not need much if any fertilizer added when mulched permanently.

These are the tulips that are being run over... is it ok to take them out and move them?

It would be better to wait until the leaves are wilted or brown and down. That being said there are times we all do things when they need to be done. If you move them take a small shovel full of bulbs and leaves and move them. You may lose bloom due to the bulb not being fully formed and cured into its best or ideal moving time. Guessing about a month from now....down and brown is the rule of thumb.

Our beautiful Hershey Estate bulbs only get planted in summer into early fall. They bloom and are almost immediately dug out the following spring after blooming. They sell grocery bags full for a couple of dollars to any and all takers. In this case they all were dug to soon to be in the best condition for next year. Never the less folks like me grab a bag or two and replant them within a week. Some bloom the following spring and some need the next growing season to rebuild the bulb. This is the price you may pay if you move them to early. It's your call.