John, I know exactly what you mean by capsule and bubble, and I've often wondered about their significance. When I was a kid and first starting out in bulbs, I was intrigued by one seeming contradiction in accounts I was reading. On the one hand, authors warned about the dangers of fungi rotting the bulbs. But on the other hand, as a confirmed dabbler, I knew that many bulbs matured inside the rotting hulk of last year's bulb. I eventually came to realize the obvious: there are good fungi and bad fungi (from our perspective as bulb growers); there are good rots and bad rots. I did a further experiment: I packed some newly dug ripe tulip bulbs in a medium which was alive with mycelium of what was probably the common button mushroom. These went into plastic bags for the summer. At the end of the summer, I checked them: the bags were full of visible, felt-like mycelium, but the bulbs were sound. I was prompted to try this because many fungi are evidently not at all tolerant of other fungi in their space. I assumed that a harmless fungus would kill any funguses dangerous to the bulbs. That hardly qualifies as a scientific experiment, but it did confirm my suspicions. Do frits have tunics? In a sense they do: very thin ones. They are certainly not like the thick leathery tunics of tulips, but many frit bulbs mature with a light coating of last year's bulb still in place. And I'll bet that contributes to the wall of the capsule. I've often wondered if this dried material contains any antibiotic properties which protect the bulb. Wouldn't it be nice to have a staff of graduate student gardeners at our beck and call! Jim McKenney jimmckenney@jimmckenney.com Montgomery County, Maryland, USA, USDA zone 7, where the first martagon lily opened today. My Virtual Maryland Garden http://www.jimmckenney.com/ Webmaster Potomac Valley Chapter, NARGS Editor PVC Bulletin http://www.pvcnargs.org/ Webmaster Potomac Lily Society http://www.potomaclilysociety.org/