Journal

Planting up Spring Bulbs for the House

At this time of year, as the sun begins to shine, I start to crave colour, flowers, scent, growth.

Realistically it is at least another six weeks until we have that in the garden and so I turn to the quick fix of potted bulbs in the house.

I love the traditional indoor flowers - the narcissi and hyacinths - but even more I love the tiny jewel like flowers of smaller spring bulbs . . . . crocus, iris, snowdrops.

The snowdrops I dig up from the garden, choosing an over crowded clump, enjoying them indoors for ten days or so and then replanting them in twos or threes.  It is how our snowdrops now spread in drifts under the trees.

Everything else I buy ready potted at the garden centre. 

They are all ready to go, I simply take them out of their pots, plant them into peat free potting compost in old bowls and cups and wait for them to flower.

You can watch how I do it here . . . . . 

And then, after they have finished flowering I snip off the dead flowers, put them back in their plastic pots while the leaves die back and then plant them out in my garden (or, in the case of the hyacinths, take them over to my parents who have a much more hyacinth friendly soil than mine)

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