Crocus in cans
Susan Hayek (Fri, 03 Sep 2004 15:58:26 PDT)

From http://www.oldhousegardens.com/

Joe Eck, writing in Horticulture
(March/April 2004), says “Crocuses can be
heartbreakers, since far less benign creatures
than bees are partial to their corms. . . . For
this reason, we learned years ago to plant all
our crocuses in black plastic nursery cans, each
covered with a lid of hardware cloth, its corners
bent down to clasp the edges. The cans are buried
so that the rims and lids lie about two inches
below the surface of the soil, and the crocus
corms are planted deep, up to eight inches, which
prevents them from splitting into tiny cormlets
too small to flower. A two-gallon can will hold a
dozen species crocus corms comfortably and still
leave room for multiplying. Our oldest crocuses
planted in this way have been in their cans for
15 years undisturbed, and still flower abundantly
each spring. Also, the perennials that come later
grow happily over and into the cans, seeming to
cause the crocuses no discomfort at all.”

Is this accurate?

--
susan, who is.....
owned by Jasper & Schubert the Standard Poodles,
Gracie the Rhodesian, Pup-Quiz the Basenji and
their Basenji brother, Jones.... on the North
Coast of CA, USA
susanann@sbcglobal.net, copyright 2004