Let postman deliver cheer for next year
Cheer yourself up – Christmas is looming large, but for the Ebenezers among us, there are far better things on the more distant horizon.
Get online or use a specialist catalogue and order a bag of summer-flowering bulbs to ensure you get them in good time for planting in spring.
You can wait until the new year and then buy them from garden centres, but getting them from a specialist normally gives you far more choice.
Lilies are still among the most popular of all the summer-flowerers, but there are many, many more equally stunningly lovely bulbs on offer and ready and able to light up the garden in summer.
Go for giant ornamental onions like Allium aflatunense, giganteum or elatum; lovely, languid irises; fascinating foxtail lilies such as Eremurus himalaicus or robustus; and with their gigantic pink trumpet flowers – definitely a plant for the flamboyant gardener.
And while you’re waiting for the postman to deliver the goods, prepare for the appearance of spring bulbs. Snowdrops are already flowering and some gardeners are even enjoying the sight of very early daffodils.
Bulbs fall generally into two groups: spring-flowering (which are planted in the autumn) and summer-flowering (which are planted in the spring).
A more accurate grouping, however, divides bulbs into hardy and tender varieties. As a rule, spring-flowering bulbs are hardy bulbs. These bulbs are planted usually before the first frost, and can usually survive the cold winter months. Many hardy bulbs, such as daffodils, can be left in the ground to flower year after year.
Most summer-flowering bulbs are tender bulbs which cannot survive harsh winter conditions and are planted in spring. They need protection until the threat of frost has vanished.
To enjoy these bulbs year after year, they should be dug up in autumn and stored indoors over the winter. A notable exception is the lily. Many summerflowering lily varieties are quite hardy.
Sometimes you can gamble, successfully, leaving tender bulbs in the soil over winter; if they are covered by a thick mulch and the ground doesn’t get waterlogged or frozen, they may well survive.