The Star: June 01, 2017

The Star 29
Gardening
Timing bulb flowering not an exact science
• By Paul Hoek
CAN BULB flowering be timed
for special occasions?
More often than not, this question
is asked in relation to a wedding.
And I can understand why
– growing your own tulips, lilies
or other bulbs would save money
and look fantastic in bouquets or
in the background of photos.
Unfortunately, the timing of
bulbs flowering is heavily reliant
on nature. And, as Cyclones Cook
and Debbie have recently reminded
us, nature and weather can be
fickle and hard to predict.
So, the question of timing flowering
for special occasions is one
that is pretty well impossible for
us to answer accurately.
What I can do, is give you a bit
more information about spring
and summer flowering bulbs to
help you decide whether or not
it’s doable for your particular situation
and region.
Spring flowering bulbs
In a nutshell, spring flowering
bulbs (like tulips, hyacinths and
daffodils) can’t just be planted
later to make them flower later.
Without any artificial chilling,
these bulbs have to be planted in
autumn (makes no difference at
which point in autumn) as they
require all the chilling that comes
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MAJESTIC: Summer bulbs such as gladioli and lilies don’t need cold weather to trigger flowering.
with winter.
Exactly when they flower will
depend on how cold the winter is,
how much rain there is, and how
early or late spring comes.
The only way to make spring
bulbs flower later than normal is
to plant them in pots and hold
them in a chiller, progressively
lowering the temperature from 9
deg C to 0 deg C over a period of
10 weeks.
Then hold them at zero and
take them from the chiller two
to three weeks before you want
them in full flower. This approach
won’t work with unplanted bulbs.
To make potted spring bulbs
flower earlier, you can use the
chilling method above and simply
take them out early rather than
late.
But there’s only a small window
in which you can make them
flower earlier. Tulips can’t be
chilled until late March because
the immature buds inside the
bulbs need to reach a certain
development stage before they’re
ready. And, they need to be chilled
for a minimum of 12 weeks.
So August would be the earliest
you could get tulips to flower –
around three to four weeks ahead
of normal. For potted daffodils
and hyacinths you can start chilling
earlier, in early March, and
have flowers in early July.
You can also get unplanted
bulbs to flower earlier. But instead
of putting them in at 9 deg C, you
can put them straight in at 4 deg
C. Do this in late March and then
plant them out in late May, they’ll
flower at least a month earlier
than normal.
Summer flowering bulbs
Summer flowering bulbs (like
gladioli and lilies) are a little
easier to manipulate into flowering
earlier or later, as they don’t
require a cold period to trigger
their flowering.
To make them flower earlier or
later you can plant them earlier
or later from July right up to
Christmas – but only if you keep
the bulbs in a good condition.
The eventual difference in
flowering time will not be as great
as the variation in planting time
from July to December. This is
because the soil and growing
conditions are cold in July to September,
and bulbs planted at that
.kiwi
Thursday June 1 2017
time will progress much slower
than bulbs planted in October or
November.
Likewise, bulbs planted in December
will flower much quicker
as they are doing all their growing
in warm soil and summer temperatures.
Nevertheless, planting
from July to December will see
a spread of flowering times over
around two to three months.
So, as you can see – forcing
bulbs to flower for a set time or a
special occasion is by no means
an exact science. But if it’s still
something you’re interested in, I
leave you two questions to think
about. Firstly, will it ruin the big
day if the bulbs haven’t flowered
yet, or are already past their best?
And secondly, is it worth the risk?
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