Planning For Spring 2007
Start planning now for a garden full of flowering bulbs
Spring 2006 is the best time to begin planning for Spring 2007. My neighbor's yard is full of spring flowering bulbs and I have a few crocus. Do you have this problem?
Every year my husband and I have the same conversation. We're out visiting a garden and he says "I love that plant. Why don't we have any of those?" And, every year he's referring to Giant Alliums. I also love Alliums but I have a hard time remembering to buy the bulbs in the fall. August comes along, the kids go back to school and next thing you know, my husband and I are having our other annual conversation. "What are we going to get the kids for Christmas?"
There must be other gardeners like me because I recently received an e-mail from White Flower Farm encouraging me to start planning for spring 2007. While spring is still fresh in my mind, it does make sense to think about those flowering gaps in the garden. I really do need to plant more spring flowering bulbs in the gardens around the front porch. This is the area I see every day and it should be bright and cheery. After all, Brent and Becky's website tells me to "Plant bulbs and harvest smiles!" My garden calendar should have future entries reminding me to move the bulbs from the backyard to the front. And, I'd really like to try some of the newer items.
There's also another gardening problem I need to fix and need a gentle reminder. Years ago I planted daffodils in with the daylilies. The plan was the emerging daylily foliage would cover up the declining daffodil foliage. It worked great for a while but the daylilies are now crowding out the daffodils and the daffodils aren't blooming like they should.
There also needs to be an entry in the garden calendar on planting bulbs in my front porch containers. All my containers could be planted with layers of bulbs for a beautiful spring show. Breck's website tells me it is easy with their 120 day flowering collection of bulbs.
And, finally, my garden calendar would remind me to buy Giant Allium bulbs in the fall. Then, my husband and I could skip our annual allium conversation. Maybe we could get an early start on discussing Christmas shopping.
Resources:
Breck's www.brecks.com
Brent and Becky's Bulbs www.brentandbeckysbulbs.com
White Flower Farm www.whiteflowerfarm.com
© Susan Mertz, May 2006. All rights reserved.
Click on Plants and Bulbs for more articles by Susan Mertz.
