PART of the pleasure of gardening lies in the anticipation of future delights. At this time of year, as the garden is beginning to hunker down for autumn and before the descent into the dark days of winter, gardeners can console themselves by planting spring-flowering bulbs, envisaging the colour and cheer they will bring when the bleak days are done.
The enchantment of most kinds of spring bulbs is ephemeral, sometimes lasting only a couple of weeks, but each is a waymarker that leads the garden out of the winter and towards summer. Long-awaited snowdrops are quickly joined by aconites, which give way to crocus, before waves of daffodils and hyacinths and an explosion of tulips and alliums. Each bulb bounds into flower and then falls back, withdrawing into itself to wait, it is hoped, for a repeat performance the following spring.
Bulbs are the most dependable of plants; with the minimum of effort, they will reliably flower only a few months after planting.
Next spring's potential flowers have already developed within the bulb. How well they perform depends less on what greets them as they emerge and much more on the conditions they faced last season. Newly bought bulbs will have been pampered in nurseries or given perfect growing conditions in fields, which means they are almost guaranteed to flower. Plant over the next two months, leaving tulips until November.
Getting established bulbs to re-flower is, of course, dependent on the extent to which the growing conditions are suited to the particular species. Many of the bulbs we grow in this country come from places where winters are cold and summers are hot and dry. Usually, a bulb in the wild will build up enough energy after blooming to produce a bud for the following year, but sometimes, even in the wild, this may take a couple of seasons. Don't be disappointed if the same happens in the garden.
Denne historien er fra September 11, 2024-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent ? Logg på
Denne historien er fra September 11, 2024-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
Allerede abonnent? Logg på
Happiness in small things
Putting life into perspective and forces of nature in farming
Colour vision
In an eye-baffling arrangement of geometric shapes, a sinister-looking clown and a little girl, Test Card F is one of television’s most enduring images, says Rob Crossan
'Without fever there is no creation'
Three of the top 10 operas performed worldwide are by the emotionally volatile Italian composer Giacomo Puccini, who died a century ago. Henrietta Bredin explains how his colourful life influenced his melodramatic plot lines
The colour revolution
Toxic, dull or fast-fading pigments had long made it tricky for artists to paint verdant scenes, but the 19th century ushered in a viridescent explosion of waterlili
Bullace for you
The distinction between plums, damsons and bullaces is sweetly subtle, boiling down to flavour and aesthetics, but don’t eat the stones, warns John Wright
Lights, camera, action!
Three remarkable country houses, two of which have links to the film industry, the other the setting for a top-class croquet tournament, are anything but ordinary
I was on fire for you, where did you go?
In Iceland, a land with no monks or monkeys, our correspondent attempts to master the art of fishing light’ for Salmo salar, by stroking the creases and dimples of the Midfjardara river like the features of a loved one
Bravery bevond belief
A teenager on his gap year who saved a boy and his father from being savaged by a crocodile is one of a host of heroic acts celebrated in a book to mark the 250th anniversary of the Royal Humane Society, says its author Rupert Uloth
Let's get to the bottom of this
Discovering a well on your property can be viewed as a blessing or a curse, but all's well that ends well, says Deborah Nicholls-Lee, as she examines the benefits of a personal water supply
Sing on, sweet bird
An essential component of our emotional relationship with the landscape, the mellifluous song of a thrush shapes the very foundation of human happiness, notes Mark Cocker, as he takes a closer look at this diverse family of birds