Tulip gambles
Rodger Whitlock (Tue, 06 Nov 2012 11:36:12 PST)

Walmart offered an interesting gamble this fall: big bags of mixed tulips for
very little money. I indulged in two bags of mixed species and one each of lily-
flowered and fringed varieties, which I've potted up in the hopes of being able
to place them out of reach of deer when they're in flower.

There's a chance that the descriptive terms "species", "lily-flowered", and
"fringed" will be accurate, but it won't surprise me in the least if all the
bulbs in each bag turn out to be the same - the varieties that the growers had
too many of this year.

I'm also trying, and not for the first time, the beautiful blue-eyed white
tulip, "Tulipa pulchella alba oculata-caerulea", in the hopes of figuring out
how to keep the bulbs from dwindling away as they have in the past.
Fortunately, it turns out that one of the gals at a local garden center
evidently knows a thing or two about keeping it going so it will form flowering
size bulbs even though potted. Her advice is to use a sandy, somewhat alkaline
soil and to feed halfway through the flowering period, then again two weeks
later.

Stay tuned next year for reports on success or failure.

--
Rodger Whitlock
Victoria, British Columbia, Canada
Z. 7-8, cool Mediterranean climate