Scilla bulbs create blue spring The Plant Lover
It’s time to plant fall bulbs for our spring pleasures and scilla is a great one to begin with: After all, it starts the spring bloom season with the snowdrops. What could be more welcome after winter than the glorious big blue drifts created by naturalized scilla bursting into bloom in early spring?
Scilla is a tiny flower to have such a big impact. Its drooping, bell-like, bright blue flower stands only three or four inches high. But in spaces that suit, it spreads and naturalizes into beautiful clear blue outdoor carpets for a week or two, transcending its small size. The bulbs that produce scilla are also very small and inexpensive, and best planted in dozens or more in full sun to part shade. They prefer well-drained soil, and bloom in moist spring earth.
I’ve always wished for colourful drifts of scilla in my yard like the lovely ones I see so often in spring. But I never planted enough to get such a spread going before last year, when a friend and I planted 40 around my day lily nursery bed. More than 30 bloomed, and I have great hopes for their survival and ultimate multiplying.
There’s a white version of this flower, and a larger version with darker blue flowers, but I prefer the simple, small, more common one.
Scilla is sometimes known by the unlovely name “ squill,” and even the plant’s genus title “ scilla” is named for a mythical monster whose image developed over time from that of an earth goddess. Nothing in the garden could be less monstrous than this unassuming and charming harbinger of spring, which will eventually give us hope that gardening season is coming around again. That makes it well worth putting these little bulbs in the ground now. jmawhinney@thestar.ca