Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, October 12, 1995 TAG: 9510120014
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-8 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: JOE HUNNINGS
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
You may have long wanted to plant bulbs, but were unsure how to incorporate them into your landscape or garden.
Fall is the time of year to plan or plant next year's bulb garden.
Here are some hints for successful planting:
Plant bulbs in clusters. Some gardeners tend to scatter their plantings, but a group of tulips planted together makes a bold spring statement.
Read labels. Beginning gardeners often believe they don't know enough to plan their gardens correctly.
Whether you buy bulbs in packets or loose from a bin, there are labels describing plant heights and flowering times.
Plan your planting. Plant low plants toward the front of the bed, taller plants in back.
Mix early and late-flowering bulbs. Your garden will be lovely all spring, and the late-blooming plants will hide the spent foliage of the early bloomers.
Add a splash of color to a walkway or drive. Plant bulbs around a lamppost, in wooded areas, or create a bed of your favorite colors.
Mix and match perennials and bulbs. Make more use of bulbs in the perennial border. Many gardeners tend to isolate their bulbs from the rest of the garden.
Bulb flowers support, rather than dominate, perennials.
Plan perennial borders to reach their flowery climax in mid- to late summer.
Perennial borders that bloom brilliantly only once per season look dull the rest of the year. Use bulbs to spice up the border in spring and fall. For example, use small groupings of soft yellow daffodils planted near Hosta sieboldiana.
This scheme creates a lovely effect, and as the foliage of the hosta grows and thickens, it hides the leaves of the spent daffodils. Leave hyacinths in the ground to flower next year, rather than removing them as you would annuals.
After a few years, the hyacinths may not be as lush as they were the first and you may choose to replant with new bulbs. Hyacinths are particularly appealing planted among soil-covering plants, such as common periwinkle (Vinca minor) and ivy (Hedera helix).
If you have a flowerless June garden, plant alliums. Allium moly, for example, is an excellent choice to flower in the June garden, that transitional period between spring and summer flowering.
Careful planning, mixing and matching bulbs and perennials, and using plants with different blooming seasons will make your garden lovely and unique.
Joe Hunnings is the Virginia Cooperative Extension agent for agriculture in the Montgomery County Extension Office in Christiansburg. If you have questions, call him at 382-5790.
by CNB