Growing Tulips And Tulips Care

Tulips Bulbs Are Easy To Grow, Cheap And Very Colorful!

Growing tulips is surprisingly easy once you understand the best conditions for planting and care. Tulips, often mistaken as Dutch, have origins traced to Southern Europe and Asia. These resilient perennial flowers come in a myriad of varieties.

Growing Conditions And When To Plant Tulip Bulbs

The ideal condition for growing tulips is cold winters and hot, dry summers. The best time of year for planting tulips is the fall, around October or November, before the ground is expected to freeze. If you plant the bulbs too early, they will grow too fast and most likely die before winter's end.

Soil Preparation For Growing Tulips

Once you decide when to plant tulip bulbs, you need to prepare the soil. Your garden must provide adequate drainage and contain dry, airy soil. Sandy soil is perfect for any flowering bulb; adding coarse sand or compost will allow for more oxygen or airy soil. Without proper water drainage, wet soil can drown the bulbs and cause fungus, disease and possible rotting of the bulbs.

How to Plant Tulip Bulbs

Tulips should be planted at 8-10 inches for large, 6-8 for average and 3-5 inches deep for smaller bulbs. You should measure from the base of the bulb and account for any additional layers, such as mulch, when determining the correct depth.

Although you must be mindful not to over-water, the bulbs require watering in the initial period after planting. In addition, you can add bulb fertilizer prior to or right after planting the bulbs. This particular type of fertilizer aids in initial growth and helps to ensure the Tulip will reappear next season.

Tulips Care And Maintenance

Tulips are easy to care for and require little maintenance. Toward the end of the spring and during the summer, when in full-bloom, the best Tulips care is not to water and to only prune dying/dead blooms.

At the end of the season, you can deadhead the plants. However, it is most recommended that you either let leaves die off naturally or only remove them when completely yellow.

Storing Tulip Bulbs

Two alternatives to storing tulip bulbs are to leave them in the ground or dig them up after the leaves yellow. Tulips are perennial plants and the first option allows nature revive the bulbs on her own. The second option involves keeping the bulbs dry and cool until late autumn, replanting in the same process as explained above.

If you are transplanting tulips you have to wait until the foliage has died back before you lift the bulbs. You can either replant the bulbs straight away or store the bulbs as described above. Same applies for dividing tulip bulbs.

Pests and Diseases

Tulips are highly durable, but you need to be wary of a few pests and diseases that can harm your plants. Squirrels are attracted to Tulip bulbs, but can be deterred by placing black netting over the top of the bulbs or sprinkling Cayenne pepper or chili flakes/powder around the garden. Aphids or spiders can also be troublesome, but can be easily washed away with water.

Tulips are mostly disease free, but can be affected by tulip fire. This disease is easily identifiable with the presence of odd, distorted foliage on the Tulip. It usually appears before the plant has bloomed, but is just as serious if you notice 'flecks and burns' anywhere on the flowered plant. The only solution is to dig out from the roots and destroy the bulb.

Flowering Time For Tulip Flowers

Tulips begin to bloom in mid-spring and last until summer. You can cut the fresh flowers or leave them in your garden.

Tulip Varieties and Types of Tulips

The genus Tulipa contains over 100 different species, with more than 4,000 varieties of plants, in countless colors, heights, shapes, sizes and even fragrances. These are split up into 3 divisions: early, mid-season or late flowering.

Early flowering Tulips bloom in March and include single early, double early, Greigil, Kaufmanniana and Fosteriana.

Common mid-season varieties, which bloom from late April to early-May, are Darwin hybrids, triumph and parrot.

Six primary classifications of late flowering Tulips, or those that bloom after May, are single late, double late, viridiflora, lily-flowered, fringed and Rembrandt. In addition, wild varieties can be found in each division.

Potted Tulips And Forcing Tulip Bulbs

Potted Tulips can brighten up your containers in the spring. Get some good quality tulip bulbs and plant them into your containers with regular potting compost. Little tulips are great for growing tulips in pots. They are less likely to fall over. You can mix tulips with daffodils or crocus as well.

If you want to enjoy a bit of early spring color indoors try forcing tulip bulbs. Bring the pots into the house in early January. Within a few weeks you should have a beautiful display.

Tulips are resilient and little care is needed to achieve beautiful blooming flowers.

More Tulip Pictures...

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