Landscaping with Bulbs--TOW
Boyce Tankersley (Tue, 07 Oct 2003 06:28:45 PDT)
We've got some beautiful examples of Colchicum coming up through various groundcovers and between clumps of some of the smaller growing Pennisetum grasses ... sort of a 'prairiesque' effect but quite effective. I would recommend replacing your turf with prairie plants (or plants that duplicate the growth and flowering habits of prairie plants). The daffs will be up and flower before the prairie plants start to get too large and the Colchicums will elongate their tubes to 'peak' through the smaller statured plants. The effect is very ornamental and provides for season long interest (year round really if you don't remove the dried grasses, etc. until just before the daffs start to appear.
Wished you and Irma lived closer. We have some beautiful examples currently in the Garden.
Boyce Tankersley
btankers@chicagobotanic.org
-----Original Message-----
From: J.E. Shields [mailto:jshields104@insightbb.com]
Sent: Monday, October 06, 2003 5:48 PM
To: Pacific Bulb Society
Subject: Re: [pbs] Landscaping with Bulbs--TOW
Hi all,
I'm not really into landscaping, but whatever one does, the result is some
sort of landscape, good or bad.
For instance:
I planted about 1000 Narcissus bulbs in clusters of 5 to 7 bulbs in grassy
areas about 4 or 5 years ago. They are actually in two swaths, one on each
side of my property. One is between the line fence and our gravel lane
going to the nursery in back. It must be about 8 to 10 feet wide and 50 to
75 feet long. The other swath is of similar dimensions but runs diagonally
in front of an open line of trees and shrubs from the front corner of our
property toward the corner of our house.
They look very nice when in bloom, and we do not cut the grass and weeds in
those areas until the foliage has started to yellow off.
I don't see much increase in the bulbs so far. I assume this is due to
inadequate fertilizer and excessive competition from grass.
Right now we have colchicums in bloom, many of them naturalized in the
grass too. I think they are particularly attractive that way, but again we
don't mow in those areas until the foliage yellows off in July each
year. This is a serious disadvantage to naturalizing bulbs in lawn areas,
no matter what species of bulbs you are using. The tall grass and weeds
look pretty lousy in June and July.
Does anyone have some advice for future naturalizing projects?
Regards,]
Jim Shields
in central Indiana
At 01:14 PM 10/6/2003 -0700, you wrote:
Dear All:
We've seen Crocus and other small bulbs naturalized in greenswards. Click
here to view the most beautiful presentation of naturalized Tulipa that I
have ever seen. http://www.hillkeep.ca/bulbs%20tulipa.htm
They're in the garden of my friend Jim Swayne, who lives in eastern
Washington state, USA, where winters are cold and dry and summers are hot
and dry. He gets 8-20" of rain a year. This is perfect for Tulipa and
many other Central Asian bulbs, and makes it sensible to grow a xeric lawn
of Buffalo grass, as he has done.
I have other pictures of Jim's tulip lawn, but he's away, so I can't ask his
permission to publish them right now.
Bulbs that tolerate a wetter winter do very well with us here in
southwestern
BC; I hope to have time later to post about them, too.
Paige Woodward
on top of Chilliwack Mountain
in southwest British Columbia
Canada
wet Zone 6
http://www.hillkeep.ca/
paige@hillkeep.ca
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Jim Shields USDA Zone 5 Shields Gardens, Ltd.
P.O. Box 92 WWW: http://www.shieldsgardens.com/
Westfield, Indiana 46074, USA
Tel. ++1-317-867-3344 or toll-free 1-866-449-3344 in USA
Member of INTERNATIONAL CLIVIA CO-OP
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