My favorite tips for growing beautiful flowers from bulb

Tulips. We know them. We love them. But do we really know the best way to grow them?

I think we can all agree that we are desperate for the bright, cheering color that tulips provide during the earliest days of spring. These gorgeous pops of happiness sprouting from long-forgotten soil seem to herald the start of the torrent of beautiful blooms to follow all season. And cut, I find their graceful, lithe shape spilling over the side of an arrangement to be the perfect touch.

However, tulips- unlike their spring counterpart the daffodil- don’t naturalize well. Or, in some cases, at all. Only a certain few types of tulip bulbs will re-bloom annually, and virtually none of the most attractive ones which have been hybridized to favor the “wow” factor over the endurance factor. While I grow flowers professionally to cut and sell, I would think even a home gardener would not want to invest bed space to a bulb that is going to put out a wimpy second act, if at all. So, what to do?

Grow them in crates

Do it like the pros, and grow them in the crates they arrive in. Among the many benefits to growing them this way, you’ll enjoy much longer stems & you can reserve your landscape for bulbs that will increase their yield over time- such as daffodils, crocus, snowdrops, & some types of allium.

By growing them in crates, you can place them (literally) anywhere that’s out of the way but still gets some sunlight and rainfall. I’ve seen people line a back fence, the unused portion along a driveway, or in my case, I throw them under my largest maple tree whose bare winter limbs allow the sunlight to reach the bulbs.

Here are my steps:

• Source your crates. If you don’t order enough bulbs to receive a crate (or you grab the smaller bags of bulbs at Home Depot or Costco) they can be sourced from the grocery story (ie milk crates) or on FB marketplace for about $3 a piece

• Line bottom of crates with newspaper or old brown paper bags. This step isn’t totally necessary, but depending on the size of the crate lattice you’ll need to find a way to reserve most of the potting soil from falling through underneath.

• Spread & firm roughly 4” of soil into bottom of crates, then plant tear-dropped shaped bulbs pointed side up. Now here’s the important part: plant them side by side, like an egg carton. Yes, touching is ok. Fill that sucker up with bulbs.

• Tulips like to be planted around 6” deep, so spread approximately that amount of potting soil (or to the top of crate) and firm.

• I water in once or twice, and then let nature do her thing. As long as the crates are exposed to the elements, you shouldn't need to worry about watering again (unless you have some sort of severe winter draught).

• Voles, squirrels, and cats can be a problem- they like to dig and disrupt what you’ve got going on in the crates. To combat this, I roll out a layer of chicken wire or hardware cloth on top of the crates and place a brick or heavy stone on each corner. You could also clip them down. Use what you have.

Here are the benefits:

One thing you’ll have to accept, right off the bat, is that you are sacrificing these bulbs to cutting & then tossing. We’ve already discussed the abysmal ROI of tulips, so as long as you expect them to be a one-hit-wonder you won’t be disappointed.

By growing the bulbs super close together, the stems will reach higher for the sun, yielding longer stems in the first place. Then, to achieve maximum stem length (and because you are tossing the bulb), PULL - don’t cut- the stem out of the crate. Pull the entire bulb (attached to flower) out of the crate and gently knock dirt off. You can cut the stem mere centimeters above the bulb, which will give you an added 3-6” over a typical tulip stem length.

Now pros will do this in what’s called the “cracking bud” stage….when the bloom head is just beginning to show its color beneath the outer sepals. At this stage, growers will then wrap the tulips in damp newspaper and store them in a cooler or fridge to use when needed. We do this because tulips quite literally “come on” at once. You can go from checking them at 9 a.m. to thousands of blooms blown open at 4 p.m. In the case of a farmer-florist, we can’t use that volume at once, and they’re often past the stage that reserve well in the cooler. So it makes more sense to pull and hold until needed. I like to take 10-15 out of the cooler at a time and let them develop in a warm place over a space of a day or two.

For the home gardener, though, you can safely wait to pull the bulb (and cut your flower) until you’re ready to place them in a vase. Depending on number planted, this may have you pulling all bulbs at once. Or, if you have a spare fridge or a wine cooler- do it the farmer way and store a handful so you can spread out the beauty over several weeks.

Questions?

You know I love talking flowers. Email me at bloomandbountytn@gmail.com and I’m happy to answer any specific questions to your garden or circumstance.

Happy gardening to you!