After a blissful summer, autumn really seems to be making its appearance. Although the garden is still in full bloom and I want to extend the summer a bit by filling the house with bouquets, September also invites us to think about next year. After all, starting this month, you can plant spring bulbs. Which bulbs will you choose? And where in the garden will you plant them?
Choosing spring bulbs
This is the most fun part of the job, I think. My golden tip is: choose what you like and don't think too much about it. You can always find a place in the garden to put some extra bulbs or plant them in a pot.
What are spring bulbs?
Spring bulbs are bought in late summer and fall, when they are dormant. They are the precursors of spring and bloom early in the spring. Think of snowdrops, blue grapes, dwarf irises, tulips, crocuses and daffodils.
There are also summer bulbs: then we are talking about dahlias, gladioli and lilies, among others.
What color spring bulbs do you choose?
While yellow and red used to dominate tulip collections, there are now many beautiful colors on the market. You can choose spring bulbs in the same shades or plant a surprising color here and there. I personally have a weakness for soft pink to light orange varieties, but the range goes very wide. There are tulips in soft lilac or pastel yellow, with pointed petals or just very round varieties that look almost like roses.
Stick in between some blue grapes (did you know muscari also exist in white?) and some bright yellow daffodils and your spring border is complete.
I selected a lot of surprising spring bulbs that you can buy in our webshop.
Planting spring bulbs
Where do you plant spring bulbs?
Spring bulbs are perfect for planting anywhere in your borders. They bloom early in spring, when many other, perennial plants are not yet budding or have no leaves. This makes them good fillers, bringing lots of color even before the rest of the garden wakes up.
Personally, I prefer to plant spring bulbs in groups, just as they occur in nature. A good tip when planting: take a handful of bulbs, drop them on the ground and then plant them in those places. That looks much nicer than if you put them all evenly spaced.
Bulbs for any soil?
Beware, spring bulbs do not like wet feet, so you need an airy soil in which the water can drain well. If this is not the case, for example with heavy clay soil, then you may prefer to plant the bulbs in a pot. By the way, this is a good tip for those who do not have a garden, but do have a terrace or balcony. Or work some sand under the soil, which will keep the bulbs from standing in water.
New flowers every month with the bulb lasagna
Spring bulbs do perfectly well in apot, by the way. Tip: Turn your pot into a bulb lasagna, with bulbs in several layers on top of each other! Such a lasagne will bloom layer after layer and thus provide your terrace or balcony with color for a long time.
Spring bulbs in the lawn?
You can also plant your spring bulbs in the lawn. That gives a very nice and surprising effect, when all that color suddenly shoots up among the grass in early spring. The downside is that you then have to wait a while to ride off the grass. Or you plant them in groups and mow neatly around where the spring bulbs are and let the grass temporarily rise a little higher there.
How do you plant spring bulbs in the lawn?
- Carefully cut off the top layer of the lawn and set it aside.
- In the cleared soil, you then plant the spring bulbs.
- Place the grass layer back on top and press gently.
How do you plant spring bulbs?
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Make a planting hole
You can make a big planting hole in which you put several bulbs or you can make 1 planting hole per bulb. For that, a bulb planter is a very useful thing. -
Choose the depth of the planting hole.
Calculate three times the height of the flower bulb to know how deep the planting hole should be. So a large bulb quickly goes about 15 cm deep, while smaller bulbs can also be planted at five to 10 centimeters. -
Place the spring bulb(s) in the planting hole.
Spring bulbs are planted with the tip upwards. From that tip the stem of the flower will later grow, so it is important that you put it in the ground correctly. In terms of distance, take the same rule as for depth: three times the size of the bulb. So large bulbs of about five centimeters (such as tulips) you put about 15 cm apart. Although I sometimes dare to plant a little closer myself. -
Cover the hole with soil.
Are you planning to plant your spring bulbs in several stages? Then stick a stick in the ground where you've planted now, that way you'll remember in a few weeks where not to dig again. -
Water.
This way the spring bulbs make roots faster and can better withstand the cold days this winter. If it's a humid period, you don't need to repeat it. Do keep an eye on the pots in which you planted bulbs: they dry out faster if it doesn't rain for a few days or if it freezes later.
