Tangled Branches: Cultivated
happenings in and around my zone 6b gardens in northern Virginia and in central Virginia
Thursday, May 12, 2005
Summer Bulbs' Progress
I had a garden disappointment a couple of days ago. The red-orange crocosmia that's been with me for years (mostly in a non-blooming state) has disintegrated. Last year, I dug it out of its too shady, too clayey home and moved it to a container full of new potting soil. It bloomed beautifully. I wondered about cold hardiness, overwintering outdoors in the container, but earlier this spring I dug around in the soil until I found the bulbs (corms? rhizomes? whatever) and they were intact and ready to grow. So I started thinking about them again a few days ago and wondered why I hadn't seen any growth yet. I again dug around in the soil, but this time I came up with a handful of mush, and another handful of mush, and more handfuls of mush. So disappointing to think that after it had survived years of neglect in the ground it was now done in by a cold spring in soggy potting soil.
Well, it's some consolation that most of the other summer bulbs I bought this spring finally seem to be growing. They've all been sulking in the cold weather to some degree, but I now see growth on all but the tuberose, and those aren't rotted but just waiting patiently for warmer weather I suppose.
There's still nothing new in bloom, and I still haven't fixed my Web photo album problems, so no new pictures yet.
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Tangled Branches: Cultivated, main page