Boyce, our local daffodil society here in the Cincinnati area works with several elementary schools and give the students free daffodil bulbs. Then we do a judged daffodil show and have various elementary-school level gardening books as prizes for the best exhibits. We know that children will not necessarily continue this interest through their teen and early-adult lives, but we hope they remember the experience and one day maybe even join up with our local daffodil society. It's a long-term investment for us! Bill Lee -----Original Message----- From: Boyce Tankersley <btankers@gmail.com> To: Pacific Bulb Society <pbs@lists.ibiblio.org> Sent: Mon, Oct 1, 2012 11:57 am Subject: Re: [pbs] Gardening meets Econ 101 Leo's question got me to thinking: More money is spent on tulips world wide than any other class of bulbs. Tulips are iconic - even kids in climates that are not conducive to growing them know what they are (personal experience). Cost less per size of inflorescence produced than any other genera currently available for fall planting. Timing is right for homeowners and property owners to be purchasing tulip bulbs for next years display. Persistence in northern landscapes - several of the species and many of the group known as Darwin Hybrids have lasted 14 years in my home landscape with minimal care. Want to expand the number of people fascinated with bulbs? (give the kids in elementary school a tulip bulb to take home and plant as part of their biology class then assign them to research the history and geography of tulips). In my opinion we need to be focusing on recruiting the next generation, not bemoaning the lack of interest of the WSJ in some of our really cool, specialized collections that we have developed over our lifetimes - that is another article - for a different publication - oriented to a different audience. Boyce Tankersley Chicago Botanic Garden On Sat, Sep 29, 2012 at 3:18 PM, Leo A. Martin <leo@possi.org> wrote: > > ... why would an author from the Wall Street > > Journal be interested in bulbs, especially Tulips? > > >