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Time to Protect Your Bulbs
Written By: Jeannie Chambers - The Accidental Gardener | Issue: 2016/11 - November
According to the Old Farmer’s Almanac, we should at least have a plan in place, because Old Man Winter will have a heavy foot this year. Once he starts tromping through our gardens, he won’t let up until Spring.
In Novembrrrrrrr, the elusive “midsummer night’s dream” morphs into an early winter’s day scream. It’s time to protect your bulbs. When it comes to bulbs, you can dig them up to protect them, or let them winter over in the ground, hoping they don’t freeze and turn to mush. Many of our Spring and Summer favorites start from bulbs – dahlias, daffodils, iris, gladioli, tulips, etc. A variety of bulb plants will delight us from mid-March through October; they’re the kind of friends we want to keep around. If protected, the bulbs get larger and produce smaller bulbs. Every two to five years, you should divide your bulb plants after they bloom.
This time of year, it’s all about the dance. The garden dance I’ll call “The March of the Mulch” (cue in some of Tchaikovsky’s “The March”). For heavy winters, you may need to mulch more than you ever thought. In parts of New York, mulchers mulch as much as 45 inches. (Say it fast “How much mulch would most mulchers mulch?”).
Remember, winter mulching isn’t to keep out weeds, or to protect from drought. Winter mulching is you putting a heavy quilt over your plants to protect them. Think of those bulbs as cold little toes – how many blankets will it take? As many as it takes. It wouldn’t hurt to put a good layer of six to 12 inches of mulch on your bulbs, and even more so for dahlias.
But, and this is where the dance of the mulch really comes in, don’t mulch too early or rodents may take up residence. They’ll think you’ve built them a winter condo, and they could cause damage to the bulbs. Wait until the ground is frozen one to two inches. Another very important part of the mulch dance; next Spring, don’t remove the mulch all at once. Spring doesn’t happen in one day either; instead of cueing “Flight of the Bumblebee,” once again turn to Tchaikovsky –“The Waltz of the Flower” works well in Spring. So grab your shovel, take a bow and start your own “March of the Mulch.”
