The aim of the blog is to share our knowledge of what to plant, what is flowering and what you should be doing to prepare for the next planting season!
Learn about Tulips
Tulips are very spectacular and provide an extensive range of flower colours, shapes and heights to fit any garden, whether large or small and they can also be grown very successfully in containers. Over the last few years tulips have become very popular as they are easy to grow and if chosen correctly you can have tulip bulbs flowering in your garden from March to May.
Tulip bulbs, like daffodils are split into 15 divisions that can be explained as follows
The 15 Divisions can be explained briefly as:
Division 1 Single Early
Division 2 Double Early
Division 3 Triumph
Division 4 Darwin Hybrid
Division 5 Single Late
Division 6 Lily flowered
Division 7 Fringed
Division 8 Viridiflora
Division 9 Rembrandt
Division 10 Parrot
Division 11 Double Late
Division 12 Kaufmanniana
Division 13 Fosteriana
Division 14 Gregii
Division 15 Miscellaneous such as specie tulips.
Cultivation
Prepare the soil prior to planting by cultivating up to 30cms of soil, on heavier soils add a couple of handfuls of grit under each tulip bulb before planting to improve drainage. Tulips prefer an alkaline soil so if your soil is acid you will need to add lime. Plant the bulbs 15cm deep and 10cm to 15cm apart. On light soils, increase the planting depths to help anchor the taller varieties. The soil around tulips will need to be kept moist during the flowering period.
Tulips prefer to be planted in full sun or partial shade, they also benefit from planting in the ground when the soil is cooling down which as a general guide should be during the month of October.
Flowering:
Tulips will flower from early March right through to late May. As soon as the petals drop, remove the flower head to conserve energy. Leave the stem and leaves to return energy to the bulb foe the following year. At this time it is also beneficial to feed with a proprietary brand of fertiliser which contains fish, blood and bone meal or similar.
Tulips in pots
The best varieties for pot growing are the dwarf varieties such as the Kaufmanniana and Gregii types although in the appropriate sized pots all the other divisions of tulips will perform very well. When growing in pots ensure that you put plenty of crocks in the botton of the pot to provide good drainage. Tulip bulbs can of course be planted touching each other if required. When using pots remember to select a pot that will remain stable when the tulips are flowering
Over wintering:
If you have a well drained soil, tulips can be left in the soil all year if necessary lift the tulips as soon as the foliage has turned yellow and store them in a dry, cool position. If the tulips have produced offsets these can be removed and will make new bulbs in the future.
Tips
Tulip bulbs do produce offsets and unlike daffodils will not naturalise very well (a very few varieties do naturalise) so will not flower for a succession of years and as such will need to be replaced at some point (this is often dependant on bulb size and variety).
Protect the emerging shoots from slugs.
Plant tulips in clumps not in rows.
