How to store tulip bulbs at home - advice from gardeners

Digging up tulip bulbs for the summer ensures their safety and lush flowering next year. This procedure is especially important for modern hybrids. However, tulip bulbs must be stored in suitable conditions, strictly following a number of rules, otherwise digging them up will only damage them.

Tulips are dug up annually or once every 3-4 years, depending on the variety and variety

Why do you need to dig up bulbs?

Varietal tulips require annual removal of the bulbs from the soil. Having released a peduncle and produced many daughter bulbs, the old root dies. The following year, this process is repeated, as a result, the conditions for development of young plants become worse: the living space is reduced, the volume of useful substances decreases. This leads to shredding and degeneration of flowers.

Before the flower bud forms, the bulb must warm up well. If you leave it in the ground, the heat will not be enough and the flowers will grow less attractive.

Digging up tulips for the winter makes it possible to properly prepare the soil: add sand or peat, apply fertilizer, remove weeds without damaging the bulbs. Cleaning the planting material from soil and loose scales, sorting and treating with a solution of potassium permanganate significantly reduces the likelihood of damage by larvae of harmful insects and fungal diseases.

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After some time, the bulbs that have not been dug up since the summer sink deeper into the ground. This prolongs germination time and worsens the conditions for the formation of flower buds. Therefore, to preserve all the qualities of varietal tulips, the bulbs must be dug up in time and kept in a suitable microclimate.

Advice from experienced gardeners

Sometimes expert advice is much more practical than dry theory. After all, owners cannot always purchase a special thermal chamber to store tulips there before planting. What to do if there are no special devices, but you want to have a beautiful flower bed?

Avid gardeners recommend storing bulbs in the pantry or basement. But we must not forget about ventilation. You can also use large boxes, having previously made a window in them for a thermometer.

It is better to immediately discard any bulbs damaged during digging or store them separately. Such tubers are susceptible to bacterial infection, which can also affect healthy bulbs.

To prevent this from happening, you need to dig carefully

It is not recommended to store tulips in a cardboard box. Since it can easily get wet, the tulips will receive excess moisture, which will quickly cause mold to develop. It is best to use regular plastic boxes. The ideal option is planting baskets. You can easily remove the bulb from them, and the basket itself is very convenient to transport.

Do not pour the bulbs in several layers. This is often done by those who have very little space. Due to such storage, the dug tuber may simply begin to rot. Sawdust copes well with excess moisture, so you can sprinkle tubers with it and not be afraid of mold or rot.

Sometimes gardeners wrap each bulb in newspaper to protect the crop from mechanical damage. This is a very labor-intensive process, but those who have extra time can use this storage method.

If the bulbs begin to sprout, then they need to be transplanted into a box, from where they can then be buried in the flowerbed. If weather conditions allow the sprouted onion to be planted in the ground immediately, then this should be done as quickly as possible.

Excavation and preparation of material

The bulbs are dug out from the soil after flowering has completed. The right time for this is selected based on the appearance of the plant. The faded color of the leaves and areas of yellowing on them indicate the maturation of the bulb and its readiness for extraction. Maturity can also be determined by the darkening of the outer scales.

Mature bulbs

Immediately after digging, the bulbs, not cleared of soil and scales, are placed in baskets woven from branches or wooden boxes and kept for seven days in a dry and warm room. A ventilated barn, veranda or gazebo is suitable for this task. During drying, the tulips should not be exposed to sunlight.

After a week, the remaining roots and covering scales are removed from the dried material. Specimens with rotting and numerous damage are thrown away, and the remainder is distributed according to variety and size. If there are minor defects, they are cut out with a sharp knife, and the cut is treated with brilliant green. Bulbs with damaged bottoms are thrown away as they are unsuitable for growing.

After this, the prepared planting material is immersed in a pinkish solution of potassium permanganate for half an hour. Then dry for a week in a well-ventilated area, spreading in one layer. The dried bulbs are sorted out again and placed according to variety and size.

Where to store tulip bulbs at home, in an apartment in winter

If there is a need to preserve tulip rhizomes until spring, you can use the wet germination method. To do this, the bulbs are placed in plastic boxes with peat or wet sawdust, sprinkled with substrate and put into the cellar. Moreover, even if the plant germinates, after planting it will bloom at the usual time.

In an apartment, you can try to preserve rhizomes using early forcing. To do this, they should be planted in boxes with soil and placed on the balcony. With the onset of frost, the plantings need to be covered with film, ventilated every two weeks, and watered as the soil dries out. After the sprouts hatch, it is recommended to place the boxes in a lighted place.

Preserving dug tulips in winter is much more difficult than in summer.

Suitable conditions

In the first month after digging out of the soil, flower buds form. Therefore, during this period, planting material is kept at a temperature of +24 degrees. Then this indicator is lowered to +20, and by the time of autumn planting to +17.

The optimal humidity should be no higher than 70%. To comply with physiological processes, the bulbs must be kept without light. Only low and diffuse lighting is allowed.

You cannot keep tulip planting material at home at temperatures exceeding +30 degrees. Otherwise, the flower buds are damaged, the flowers become dehydrated and die.

Premises requirements

Before planting, you need to keep the tulip seed in a cool room. It is quite difficult to create such a microclimate in a city apartment. The basement or attic of a house, as well as a barn, are suitable for this purpose. This should be a dry place with good ventilation, but without access to light.

It is important to protect the seed from rodents if the storage location is chosen in the basement or attic of a private home. To do this, you need to first poison the mice and rats or put the tulips in old nylon stockings or mesh and hang them from the ceiling. This way, all conditions will be met, and rodents will not get to the desired bulbs.

Many people believe that tulips can be kept in the vegetable drawer in the refrigerator. This opinion is wrong. It is correct to store the material for sowing at elevated temperatures for the first two months, and then gradually reduce it. It is impossible to create such conditions in a regular refrigerator, so the seed material will inevitably be spoiled.

Requirements for containers

In order to preserve tulips well, containers must meet the requirements for size and material. Before planting in the ground, it is important to provide free air access to the bulbs.

Tips for proper storage:

• It is recommended to keep planting material in boxes made of boards;
• it should lie in one layer;
• to protect it from moisture, the seed must be sprinkled with sawdust;
• To protect against damage, it is necessary to wrap the bulbs individually in newspapers.

Do not place bulbs in polyethylene bags, plastic buckets and basins, or cardboard boxes. In closed containers, they quickly become overgrown with mold and begin to rot, and pathogenic bacteria and fungal infections accumulate on the cardboard.

When to plant tulips

Compliance with planting dates plays an important role in growing this crop. Planting too early may cause the bulbs to sprout prematurely, which will be damaged if frost occurs. If they are planted late, full rooting will not occur, which means that flowering in the spring will occur later. The determining factor for planting is the soil temperature at a depth of 15 cm. By the time the bulbs are planted, it should be 8-10°C. It takes 20-25 days for the roots to grow thoroughly in the soil. The air temperature at the time of planting is usually around 0°C or slightly higher.

Planting tulip bulbs

When to dig and plant crocus bulbs

Recommended timing for planting tulips by region:

• Middle zone - from early September to early October;
• Siberia - from late August to early September (a little longer in warm weather);
• Middle Urals - mid-September, Southern Urals - early October;
• Stavropol Territory, Crimea, Kuban - towards the end of October.

Important! In Ukraine, tulips are planted in the fall in the same numbers as in the south of Russia. The timing for Belarus coincides with the timing of the Middle Zone.

It is also worth ensuring proper soil preparation and proper planting. Heavy clay soil must be made permeable and nutritious by adding sand, peat, and rotted manure. The acidity of the soil must be adjusted so that this parameter is in the range of 6.5-7.8 pH. You can acidify the soil by adding peat; wood ash or limestone will help neutralize the acidity. Sandy soil is well seasoned with compost and mineral fertilizers.

Note! Fresh manure should not be used to feed bulbous crops. This causes plants to burn their roots and cause fungal diseases.

The dug up soil is leveled and furrows are marked for planting tulips. They should be shed for disinfection with a solution of potassium permanganate. For large bulbs, dig holes 8-12 cm deep at a distance of 12-15 cm from each other. Small nodules are planted denser and closer to the surface.

In light soil, the bulbs can be buried a little more, but in heavy soil, vice versa. Before planting in an area where water stagnates, a sand cushion is laid out at the bottom of the hole or a handful of expanded clay is poured. It is advisable to dust the bulbs with wood ash, this will give them additional protection. When planting, they are lightly pressed into the ground so that there are no air pockets underneath them, and then watered.

Important! If the planting material is not uniform in size, you can make the hole slightly wider, place a large onion in the center, and several small ones around it.

After planting, the holes are sprinkled with fertile soil and the surface is leveled so that water does not stagnate in the flowerbed during the autumn rains. If there is no rain within the next 5-7 days, the plantings need to be watered, otherwise the roots will not grow well. To keep your flower bed bright in the spring, you can plant tulips with different flowering periods in one place or place other early flowering plants nearby.

Transplanting tulips

In the northern regions, after planting, tulips are mulched with peat or compost; the layer thickness should be about 4 cm. In the spring, the mulch is not removed from the flowerbed, as it prevents the appearance of a hard crust on the soil surface, which delays the emergence of sprouts and the penetration of moisture to the bulbs. If winters are too cold, you can add an additional layer of straw on top after the soil has completely frozen.

For your information! Many gardeners have adapted to growing tulips in plastic baskets with a lattice bottom. This planting allows you to quickly and easily form a flower bed and remove nests from the ground without fear of damaging the bulbs. An additional benefit of this method is that the plastic prevents rodents from reaching and damaging the tubers.

Tulips, earlier than many other flowers, begin to delight summer residents with bright buds and give them a spring mood. The abundance of varieties makes it possible to build spectacular and original compositions. Proper storage of the bulbs of this crop allows you to later enjoy its beauty.

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Storage problems and their solutions

In addition to creating the conditions necessary for high-quality storage of bulbs, the compliance of the microclimate in the room is periodically checked. The material is inspected monthly for damage, mold and signs of rotting. Instances with signs of disease or suspicious spots are immediately removed from the general container and thrown away. This is important to prevent the possible transfer of infection to other bulbs.

With insufficient moisture, the bulbs soften and become less elastic. To correct the situation, several wide containers with water are placed in the building where the seed is stored.

Mold on planting material

Another way to solve the problem is to buy a household humidifier equipped with a humidity sensor. When the device shows that the optimal indicator has been achieved, it is turned off.

If there is excess humidity in the storage, rot and sores appear on the tulip. A signal for the need for urgent drying of the room will be drops of water appearing on the surface of the bulbs. Then the humidity is reduced by turning on a household heater for several hours.

Diseases, quality determination

The quality of flowers is determined by their appearance:

• The leaves are a juicy, bright green color.
• The stem is quite thick, up to 1 cm in diameter.
• The tip of the stem closer to the cut is white.
• Stem length is 40-60 cm (if less, then the tulip variety is low).
• The bud is closed.
• The bulbs are without flaws, hard, brown husk.

If the leaves have gray or yellow spots, then the plant is affected by a fungus (gray rot). This is caused by keeping the flower in the cold coupled with dampness. Damaged leaves must be eliminated, because... if the stem is damaged, the tulip will die.

Watery bulbs with a pink spot is a soft rot that will sooner or later lead to the flower wilting. The reason is planting in warm soil (above +12 °C). If a lesion is detected, it is necessary to disinfect the soil with a fungicide or renew it, and also be sure to drain it.

In addition to these diseases, there are: fusarium, typhullosis, root rot, penicillosis, trichoderma, August disease - the fight against each of them comes down to maintaining optimal growing conditions, excluding contaminated elements, treating and disinfecting tools with formaldehyde, and beds and bulbs with potassium permanganate and fungicide .

Storage until spring

When it is not possible to plant tulip bulbs in autumn or in case of late acquisition of seed, conditions are provided for long-term storage of flowers until spring using early forcing:

• Having prepared the soil mixture for bulbs in advance, the seed is planted in boxes in the fall. The thickness of the soil layer in such a container should be 40 cm or more. The distance between individual copies is 5 cm.
• Containers with planted tulip bulbs are sent to the basement, where the air temperature is kept in the range from +3 to +5 degrees. Violation of these boundaries leads to freezing of the material or too rapid germination.
• Future flowers are briefly inspected weekly. If necessary, moisten the soil, but do not allow the soil to flood. Excess moisture causes flowers to rot.
• The first shoots appear in late February or early March.
• With the final establishment of warm weather, containers with plants are taken outside, where after a while flowers bloom on them.

In spring, tulips cannot be transplanted from boxes into open ground. During the winter, the plants will already have time to form a strong root system. An attempt to replant them will inevitably damage the underground part. Then, even if the plant develops well, flowers will not appear this year.

Disembarkation

Tulips are planted in the ground 6-8 weeks before the onset of frost, when the soil temperature drops to approximately +7...+10 ℃. Some gardeners advise doing this after the first frost. Before planting the bulbs, it is recommended to soak them in potassium permanganate for up to 30 minutes.

Autumn planting is sometimes carried out after the first frost.

Bulbs are planted at a depth three times their size : for large ones it is 12-14 cm, for small ones it is 6-8 cm.

Tulips can be planted in the same place every four years.

Before the onset of winter frosts, the soil can be mulched with a layer of peat (up to 3 cm thick). In spring, the mulch is removed immediately after the snow melts to avoid the bulbs getting warm.