forcing bulbs

Oopsie. I finally decided to figure out what was in the garbage bag in the seed-starting area of the basement, and it's a dahlia. Sprouting. Now what do I do?

In search of perfect paperwhites . . . haven't gotten there yet. But I've learned that pebbles just don't work for me.

Bulb forcing has had its ups and downs this winter, but I continue to experiment. One day I'll figure out what works best, but in the meantime, come learn along with me!

The tagline of my blog is "Hardy plants for hardy souls," because you have to be a hardy soul to endure the fits and starts of winter ending and spring arriving. Cold climate gardeners are resilient in the face of adversity and prepared for setbacks before winter is gone for good. Here's how I'm coping. How about you?

Those lilies-of-the-valley I forced? I transferred them to a decorative container and they became the centerpiece for a tea party baby shower. It turned out very well, if I do say so myself. Click the link to learn how I did it and view the pretty pictures!

Move over, hyacinths. Stand back, amaryllis. It's time for lily-of-the-valley to take center stage. Yes, lily-of-the-valley! Did you know you could force lily-of-the-valley indoors during the winter? It's not too hard at all, if you buy specially prepared roots. And the fragrance is wonderful, not to mention the pleasure of actually watching plants grow while it's snowing outside.

Sometimes plants surprise me. It surprises me that this 'Sweet Nymph' amaryllis is blooming. Why? Because I didn't follow any of the "rules" for getting an amaryllis to re-bloom. I did not put it (or my other amaryllises) in a closet in mid-August or early September. Why would I, when the plants were growing lushly? [...]

I have whined before, here and on Facebook, that some of my Christmas cacti (Schlumbergera hybrids, also called zygocacti) were failing. I got plenty of advice as a result, most of which I was already following, when I happened to stumble upon an old blog post of Matt Mattus'. In it he advised to avoid [...]

I was really looking forward to bulb forcing this winter. I had read Bulb Forcing by Art Wolk, my new bulb-forcing bible (review here), and was inspired to broaden my selection of bulbs to force, plus I had a gift certificate from Brent and Becky's Bulbs that made broadening my selection painless. So far, however, [...]