Lifting the spring bulbs

Our spring bulb bed has been facing a problem for the last couple of years. It’s being taken over by much larger plants.

As the natives (and non-natives) have matured around it, it’s become clear that it’s time to move the spring bulbs along.

So this week as much of the country was in state of emergencies caused by massive storms, I took advantage of our miraculous sunny day and lifted the bulbs.

The bulb garden

I began planting this garden in 2020 with a box of 50 mixed daffodils. The next year I added some tulips—a few of which have continued to pop up each year against the odds.

Then in about 2022-ish I lifted them all. I gave the gardens at work some of mine, and swapped them out for some of the incredible collection there which was in dire need of lifting at the time.

At that point, I completely lost track of what I was growing. I’d come across some clearance bulbs, like my freesias, and throw them in. Other years I was given bulbs like the bluebells, which I threw in here too. If it was a bulb, this garden was the default location.

I haven’t really been collecting them that long, but it’s developed into a delightful mess filled with a little bit of everything.

Summer and spring

Growing between the spring bulbs are the dahlias. They’ve been a complication for a few years because I didn’t want to disturb them lifting the spring bulbs.

But the self-sown ake ake and the ever-expanding Canna edulis have both achieved dominance. The dahlias are also going to need to come out of this garden, but that is a worry for another season.

I took to the garden with a fork and a bucket. I worked as thoroughly as I could, carefully working from one end of the garden to the other, avoiding the trees and dahlias as much as I could.

A few hours later I’d collected a pretty huge tray filled with so many different kinds of bulbs.

New pastures

There’s a little grassy weedy verge at the top of our driveway which I’ve been puzzled about for a while.

We are finally in a place where we can confidently say we’re probably not going to alter what it looks like as we develop the property. But it’s annoying to maintain. The lawnmower can’t get on it. The cows can’t reach it.

But it welcomes and waves goodbye to everyone visiting the property. I thought maybe the bulbs could go here. It’s a little cooler, so the tulips might actually prefer it here.

So I’ve spent the last few months spraying it back and taming the kikuyu. Over the next month or two, I’ll work to plant the bulbs and cover it with bark mulch.

With a little luck my bulbs will be welcoming and waving goodbye to visitors in spring.

But they’ll also probably still be at our front door too. I don’t believe I managed to get them all out of the original garden, no matter how carefully I worked. They’ll pop up and continue to put smiles on our faces for years to come.