We just learned that our book is available as of today at Timber Press in the New Books section and it continues to garner rave reviews all across the country.

David Deardorff

Glorious flowering bulbs of summer can light up your garden all through the warm summer months. Some, like tuberous begonias and dahlias, bloom all summer long. Others, like gladiolus, cannas, and crocosmia, have a more definite and shorter season of bloom. All are among the most flamboyant of summer flowers.
They come in a brilliant rainbow of colors, many provide much needed height, and all add interesting texture and form to your garden. Oddly, though all those mentioned above are called bulbs, none has a true bulb. Instead of real bulbs they have a variety of underground storage structures like corms, tubers, or tuberous roots.

Dahlias have tuberous roots that are sometimes called "bulbs".

If you live in a cold winter climate, you need to dig up most of your summer flowering bulbs in autumn before hard freezes occur. Unlike spring blooming bulbs such as tulips, daffodils and crocus, these summer blooming bulbs are tender and will be killed by winter cold. You should dig up tender summer flowering bulbs in the autumn before hard freezes occur. Then you divide them, store them through the winter somewhere where they won’t freeze, and re-plant them in the spring. Garden jargon calls this process “lifting” the bulbs.

In cold winter areas Crocosmia corms need to be lifted and stored over winter.

Dig them up, shake off as much of the soil as you can, and set them on newspaper in cardboard boxes to dry for a time. When the little bit of soil clinging to them has dried out, brush away the soil and store them in labeled paper bags until time to plant again next spring.
A couple of tips for success:
First, never store bulbs in plastic bags. Plastic bags don’t breathe, and they trap humidity. Both conditions promote bulb diseases. Put them in paper bags.
Second, dust them with sulfur after you’ve cleaned them up and before storing them. A good way to get them dusted is to put them in a zip-top plastic bag (only temporarily!), add a tablespoon of dusting sulfur, close the bag tightly, and shake. You should wear a face mask to avoid breathing the sulfur dust into your lungs and you should wear gloves to avoid getting it on your skin. Sulfur is a mineral element, mined from the earth, and is routinely used in organic gardening practices to control fungus disease. It is a relatively safe product but some people can have allergic reactions.
When your bulbs are well coated with sulfur, put them into a paper bag, label the bag with the kind of bulb, the name of the cultivar, and the date, and store your summer flowering bulbs in a cool, dark place through the winter until you can plant again in the spring. Dusting with sulfur prevents fungus spores from germinating as bulbs in storage can easily become infected with blue bulb mold, a fungus disease.
If, in spite of your best efforts, some of your bulbs become moldy while in storage, throw them away. Don’t plant them. And don’t keep them near your other bulbs. You’ve heard how one rotten apple can spoil the whole barrel. Same goes for bulbs. You don’t want one rotten bulb to spoil all the rest.

Lots of people are talking and blogging about our book and creating quite a buzz. We are pleased to report yet another book review about our book from Our Little Acre. It’s great to see how folks are enjoying being detectives and using the flow charts to figure out what’s wrong with their plants. Terrific. Everybody says this is one book you can’t live without if you love plants.

Kathryn Wadsworth

David has already addressed the in’s and out’s of spring-blooming bulbs – those harbingers of bounty from the earth – and given us some great tips about selecting and planting them, but right now it’s fall, and autumn always has funereal overtones for me. The weather gets cranky. Clouds hide the sun and darken my days. The temperatures drop, and I shiver all too often.  I am a lover of the sun, of beaches, of slouching around in T-shirt and shorts. When leaves begin to turn and drop to the ground, revealing the skeletal structure of trees; and when bright annual flowers have disappeared; and perennial plants wilt and die back – I feel a sense of loss.
To cheer myself up, I look to the promise of what lies ahead.
Bulbs that we plant in autumn embody that promise. They are full of life. Hibernating like bears, they wait for that first hint of renewal, a slight rise in the temperature, and a few more moments of light from the sun.
Most of the bulbs we plant in North America for their spring show come from far away – the sunny shores of the Mediterranean – Turkey, Italy, Spain, and North Africa. I know these places are cold in winter. (I lived in Spain for a time). In fact, this is why bulbs need at least six weeks of cold – to mimic the conditions of their homelands. But all these places are drenched by the sun – in other words, my native habitat (despite winter cold).
I am encouraged when David renews our bulbs. He makes sure they are healthy. He selects new ones to add to the mix of flowers, vegetables, and fruit we grow each year. And he plants some in pots, “forcing” them to brighten the house in winter. Though this last sounds cruel, it is actually the garden jargon term for bringing any plant into flower when we want them to, rather than letting them flower naturally outdoors. When these forced plants flower mid-winter, they bring a bit of sun-drenched spring into our home.
Already I look forward to that moment when tiny leaf-tips poke from the ground outside and peek through snow. The first signs of sunny days to come. This moment often signals the way to unexpected treasures. The tiny stamens of crocus flowers become that herb, saffron, a taste I grew quite fond while roaming those Mediterranean shores. Indeed, after witnessing the women grow the crocus– nurturing, harvesting, and drying these delicate threads of flavor – I never questioned their price again.
Even as autumn’s gloom closes around me, I feel cheered as bulbs lie dormant, waiting to proclaim the exuberance of spring.

We just received another review of our book by Chani West-Foyle posted on Timber Press Talks the blog of Timber Press. The review is delightful and fun, well worth checking it out. Click on Review to follow the link and read it for yourself.

David Deardorff

It’s November and we’re heading into the dead zone. Winter is a’comin’ in and your garden is going to sleep. To get you through the winter doldrums, think about spring bulbs. Imagine cheery, colorful crocus brightening your dreary days in late winter and very early spring, as they pop through the snow. Picture bright tulips, golden daffodils, and other spring flowering bulbs following behind the crocuses in a symphony of color through March, April, and May. You can make it so by planting spring blooming bulbs now.

Spring flowering tulips brighten the landscape.

Go to your local garden center and check out the bulb display. Every autumn, garden centers, nurseries, grocery stores, and catalogs tempt us with gorgeous color photos of bulbs in full bloom. Like brightly colored candies they lure and seduce, beckoning us to purchase a bag full of hope, the promise of spring. Bins, baskets, and bags are filled with plump bulbs just waiting for you.

Making selections from the hundreds available can be daunting.

But how does one select? There are so many choices and most of us can’t have them all. We have to select some and reject others. There are three main criteria to consider when choosing which bulbs to buy. First is color, next is season of bloom, and finally, height.
Color is entirely a matter of personal preference but you should think about what will be behind the flowers. If the bulb flowers are going to be in front of a wall (your house for example) what color is the wall? If your house is yellow, then yellow tulips or daffodils will be invisible. Choose flower colors that are analogous or complementary to the background color.

Be sure to read the label and look for season of bloom. Each kind of bulb will have a label describing the season of bloom as early, mid-season, or late. By making appropriate selections you can have a choreographed sequence of color in your garden for as long as three months, just using bulbs alone.

Height is another important factor. Put the shortest bulbs in the front, the mid-range ones in the middle, and the tallest in the back. That way they can all be viewed and enjoyed equally. However, if your bulb garden is an “open bed”, that is, there is no wall, fence, or hedge at the back so you can view it from all sides, then arrange the bulbs with the tallest in the middle. Surround them with the medium height bulbs and put the shortest bulbs around the outside edge.

Additional tips for success. First, when selecting bulbs, give them a squeeze. Make sure they’re firm. If they’re soft and squishy do not buy them, you’re only buying disappointment. Second, inspect them for moldy spots. If you see tiny spots of blue, yellow, or pink mold do not buy them. These symptoms (squishyness and mold) signal disease or pest issues that, at worst, may infect your garden and, at best, result in fewer, smaller flowers than you wanted. Third, get your bulbs into the ground before it freezes. Bulbs need six weeks of cold weather in the ground in order to grow roots and flower. Without the cold weather they cannot flower. And besides, the longer they stay at room temperature the more they dry out and use up their energy reserves just trying to stay alive.

Handled properly, spring flowering bulbs live for many years. Daffodils and crocus in particular will bring you cheery smiles year after year for a long time to come.