Hello Uli, Thank you for sending your method of planting potted bulbs in the ground. I also have lost many bulbs to voles and mice; these rodents seem to use the mole tunnels to devour fleshy roots during winter. Your plastic-container method sounds effective and practical--thank you for sharing! Carol HZ 5 CT, USA In a message dated 12/7/2011 5:34:36 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, johannes-ulrich-urban@t-online.de writes: Hello Carol, This is a very good method I use EVERY year. I cannot grow bulbs like tulips, crocus or hyacinths in the open ground as I have a lot of rodents that will eat them all the time. so I plant them in big pots, bury the pots lower than the rim and cover the pot hermetically either with wire mesh or a suitable other material to stop the mice from entering the pots from above. Then an extra layer of soil to protect from frost. In spring I check for growth and when severe frosts are over I unearth the pots and put them where I want them to flower. I add long acting fertilizer as well. Normally I can re-use the same bulbs for at least one more season, but tulips tend to degenerate very quickly (I suspect virus) and will not flower any more in the third season. I am not sure if it is a good idea to unpot the bulbs in full growth in spring, this may cause root disturbance. Some bulbs may be more disturbed by this than others. Maybe if this is done at an early stage of growth this might be less harmful and using a compost that makes good rootballs that do not fall apart when unpotting may also help. I do the same with summer growing bulbs like lilies and Gladiolus as they are prey to rodents as well. But these pots are stored in my cellar in winter. For lilies I have tried a new method this year (sucessful so far): here in Germany we can buy cheap big containers made of a solid but flexible black plastic, They are made for builders to mix concrete and the like and contain about 100-200 litres. I cut the bottom off, dug an appropriate hole, covered the bottom of the hole with good quality wire mesh and sunk the bottomless container with the rim just exposed. I ensured the mesh fitted tightly to the walls of the sunken container. Filled up with good compost and planted valuable Lilium. My rodents usually come from below and so far the lilies are there and have grown well, needed some extra water in dry spells, but this saves me carrying yet another big pot...... and the rim is barely visible. Uli _______________________________________________ pbs mailing list pbs@lists.ibiblio.org http://pacificbulbsociety.org/list.php http://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbswiki/