Flowers for a fresh start
Plant amaryllis bulbs now for a bright new year
AMARYLLIS are popular gifts at Christmas time – the luxurious trumpet flowers in rich colours suit the festive season. It’s also nice to plan for flowers that will cheer us up in January and February, so this weekend, here’s a project that’s indoors, easy to do and will be something nice to look forward to in the new year.
So what do you need? First, source your bulbs – they are widely available at the moment. Their correct name is Hippeastrum so you may find them sold under this name as well.
As well as the traditional red and pink flowered varieties such as ‘Royal Velvet’ which is a Christmassy deep crimson, they also come in pure white such as ‘Mont Blanc’, or with a flush of pink like the beautiful ‘Apple Blossom’. Or for something quite different, look out for ‘Evergreen’, a delicious zesty lime colour that gives a more contemporary appearance to this bulb.
‘Nymph’ is a very fancy variety with big white double blooms veined with red – a group of three in a pot would make a really gorgeous table centrepiece.
Bulbs are big and nd relatively expensive ve but one stem usually produces a number er of blossoms. If you look ook after them correctly, they ey will increase in size and nd flowering stems year ear after year.
Next, find a suitable able container, preferably bly with drainage holes.
The bulbs like to o be tightly packed so if f you are doing them singly you should use a small l pot not much wider than the bulb itself – give a margin of an inch or so for it to sit in.
Multipurpose compost is fine with added grit or perlite for drainage e as they don’t like to o sit in soggy soil.
If you don’t have grit, even a handful of gravel at the base of the pot will help.
Layer some compost in the pot, then sit the bulb on top and start packing in the compost tightly around the bulb. The main thing to remember here is to have at least one third of the bu bulb above the compost – its “n “neck and shoulders” should be vis visible.
W Water and place in your wa warmest room in the house – heat will induce the quickest growth – and in a bright spot. Like lilies, this plant is toxic for cats and dogs so ensure they don’t access it.
Keep the compost damp until you see some leaves growing over the next few weeks and from then on keep well watered though never sitting in water.
If you notice the stem starting to lean towards the light, regular rotation will help even this out. You may also need to support larger stems with a stake or some garden twigs artfully arranged.
All going well, you will see the bud developing and flowers emerging within six to eight weeks of planting.
Once it flowers, you want to slow things down so place it in a cooler part of the house to prolong flowering, which should last a month.
After flowering, treat as you would most bulbs – remove the dead flowers but allow the stem to die back naturally.
Keep the plant alive by watering and occasionally giving a liquid feed to allow the leaves to photosynthesise and build up the bulb’s reserves for next year.
Bulbs can go outdoors in their pots for summer for ease of storage. To help it go dormant for a couple of months, at the end of the summer pop it somewhere cool and dark like a garage and leave it be, no watering at all. Then this time next year, it will be ready to be brought back into the warmth to go again.