It's only September but this is the best time to plan your garden for spring. It can be difficult to spend time, money and effort on flowers that won't show for another 6 months, but now really is the moment to let your creative juices flow and plan a beautiful display of spring-flowering bulbs. Don't worry about all the rules, you can flaunt them if you like. Get the bulbs, keep them cool and dry until late October and then plant them. Experts say that you should dig them up after they have finished flowering and the leaves have died down, but don't let that deter you, if you plant the bulbs a bit deeper than the instructions tell you to you'll be able to plant the rest of your perennials and annuals on top of them. The bulbs will shoot their stems up between the other plants and although they might flower a week later than normal you will be able to leave them in permanently. No digging up bulbs after they have died back, just leave them in. Yes, the bulbs may reduce a bit in quantity and quality over the years, but I'm willing to accept that if it means I don't have to scrabble around digging out spent bulbs in early summer. And who has cool, dry storage space for bulbs in summer anyway? Certainly not me.
Here are the beauties which will form our spring display next year:
Photo: Crocus
Allium Globemaster. We planted these two seasons ago and their huge, huge purple pompoms are an absolute delight. I've counted at least 10 bees feasting on a pompom at a time, so as well as being gorgeous they provide lots of food for our yellow and brown-striped friends. A big plus.
Photo: HGTVGardens
Tulipa 'Queen of Night'. This is beautiful, but beware - if you plant it in the shade it will simply look like a dark blob. It needs to be in a sunny setting in order to shine. I think it looks very pretty set against silvery foliage such as lavender or a low-growing eucalyptus, which really contrast with this silky black plum colour.
Photo: internetgardener.co.uk
To add a touch of lightness I have chosen to add
Tulipa 'Apricot Beauty' for next year. There is a chance that this lovely soft colour could end up being much more vibrant since the soil in our garden is very rich, but it looks so beautiful in the photos that I'm willing to take a chance.
Photo: Tuinenstruinen.org
Allium 'Atropurpureum', a souvenir from a day spent at Wisley Flower Show a few weeks ago. The colour reminds me of crushed blackcurrants... I'm quite excited about this as I love dark coloured flowers.
Photo: Fluwel.nl
And finally, as another touch of lightness, and in case Apricot Beauty turns out more like the orange of smoked salmon: Tulipa 'Belle Epoque'. It's a peony-flowering variety and it looks divine. I think I'll have to plant lots of this since I am already looking forward to picking an armful for a vase.
A word of warning: it's all too easy to spend a lot of money when you click and buy tulips online. I would suggest choosing the lowest priced option for those bulb varieties that you want a lot of and spending the big money on rarer specimens which you can use as accents or focal points here and there. I've shopped around and found that J.Parker has some of the lowest prices among the well-know internet retailers, followed by Crocus, although there are many others. Avon Bulbs has top-top notch bulbs and some really exciting varieties (take a look at their Scilla Peruviana) - they consistently win prizes at Chelsea Flower Show - but they are quite a bit more expensive. Find out which varieties you want and then see how many you can get from one supplier - what we often forget is that savings on bulbs can often be wasted on postage costs when we buy from more than one supplier.
Supermarkets also sell bulbs and sometimes they are very reasonable but you might have to put up with slightly loud colour combinations as they tend to sell mixed bags of tulips. Morrisons has a very pretty collection of 4 different white narcissi for only £2 (10 bulbs) which I think is worth trying out, and the above-mentioned 'Queen of Night', also at £2 (10 bulbs). Waitrose, which collaborates with Crocus and therefore gets a good quality selection, has a number of tasteful combinations on sale right now at decent prices. The trick with supermarket and garden centre bulbs is to buy them early, as they tend to dry out on the shelf (specialist suppliers keep their bulbs carefully at exactly the right temperature and humidity to ensure that they stay in optimum condition). Better to keep them cool and dark at home while you wait for the time to plant them out, rather than wait for them to go on sale in late November (Something I know all about as I'm a shark when it comes to picking up items at knock-down prices. I've invariably found that at least 30% of sale bulbs don't perform, so it's not actually a saving).
