Building up blooms

We live in a world of instant gratification. If you want something for lunch, you don't cook, you run by McDonalds. If you want a soda, you don't go to the refrigerator and open up a 2-liter bottle, you run by a convenience store. If you're at home and you want dinner, you don't prepare a salad, bake a potato and grill a steak, you find something to microwave.

Our desire for instant gratification goes beyond food. We do our banking at a drive-through. The Internet on our computer is not fast enough so we get DSL. We drive only on interstate highways; the old two-laners are so slow.

Even in the field of gardening, instant gratification is prevalent. Instead of starting mums in the spring, and watching them grow all summer, we buy large, gorgeous mums in the fall and plant them -- instant flowerbed. We find trees to plant in our yard that are 15 feet to 20 feet tall instead of growing them from small liners -- instant forest.

Instant gratification is sometimes necessary. For example, a microwave dinner is a good thing when you are really busy. The dinner gets you fed quickly, and you can be off to your next activity. Unfortunately, you lose something in the process. What a great family time you can have when Dad is flipping the hamburgers, daughter is chopping lettuce for a salad, son is setting the table and Mom is preparing the baked beans. Teamwork is required, which means communicating, to get everything ready at the same time. There is more to dinner than just eating.

So it is with a tulip garden. You can go to your local garden center in the spring when tulips are blooming and buy some in pots. You can then go home and place them in your landscape and you have an instant flowerbed. Unfortunately, the variety in color, size and petal configuration will be somewhat limited.

On the other hand, you can enjoy your tulip garden for six months, with planning, shopping, planting and anticipating. In addition, you can involve other members of your family in the process. Let me tell you how.

Now is the time to select and purchase your tulip bulbs. In order to do this, you nee d to make some decisions. Tulips come in early season, mid-season and late season varieties. This means that some bloom earlier than others. The exact bloom date will vary depending upon weather conditions. Just remember that late season varieties will always bloom later than early season varieties.

You also need to decide on the plant height that you want. When selecting tulips look on the packaging to determine how tall each variety gets. When planning your tulip bed, and when planting it, you will always want to put the taller tulips in the back and the smaller tulips in the front.

Of course, color combinations are extremely important. You can find tulips in every color of the rainbow, and in some colors, such as almost black, that are not in the rainbow. You also will need to make selections based on petal count and petal configuration. Some tulips have so many petals that they actually look like peonies. In addition, some of the petals have entire margins, while others are fringed.

Make you selections and purchases as soon as possible. You will find the best selection of tulip bulbs on garden center shelves right now. Later on you will have to be content with what is left.

Because we may still have several weeks of warm weather in the region, you will want to wait until late fall to plant them. If planted now, the bulbs might sprout yet this fall. Exposes foliage is susceptible to winter freezes and may get damaged. The bulbs will not sprout if planted later when soils are cold.

When you do plant your bulbs, make sure that you mix peat moss in the planting bed. Peat mixed with our native clay soils will result in a friable loam that your tulip bulbs will thrive in. In addition, place a tablespoon of bone meal under each bulb. This high phosphorous natural fertilizer will encourage good root development on the bulbs. Remember good roots are always the best foundation for a good plant.

When planting, you should also dip your bulbs in flowers of sulfur or spray them with Ropel. Either product will discourage squirrels and voles from digging them up during the winter. After all squirrels and voles need something to eat during December, just as they do in July.

Quite often gardeners plant just a few bulbs here or there. Unfortunately, when spring comes along, and the anticipated show comes up, disappointment sets in. To get a really goo show with tulips you need to plant, at a minimum, six per square foot. If you are planting them in rows, plant no farther apart than every six inches.

I hope this article explains how to produce a great tulip garden in the spring. Even more enjoyable is the inclusion of friends and family in the activity. Who knows, you may even be starting a great annual tradition.

Send your gardening and landscape questions to Paul Schnare at P.O. Box 699; Cape Girardeau, Mo. 63702-0699 or by e-mail to news@semissourian.com.