Tulips are one of the most beautiful spring flowers associated with the international women's holiday and the onset of warm sunny days.
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Many novice summer residents think that growing a crop is very simple: you planted the bulbs in the soil and, with folded arms, you wait for them to sprout. But this is not so - planting tulips requires knowledge and practical application.
Today we will tell you about the basic rules of the planting process - from the choice of bulbs, their processing and ending with the preparation of the soil, burying the planting material into the ground.
Harvesting and storage of bulbs
The end of summer and the beginning of the first month of autumn is the most suitable time for harvesting planting material. It is at this time that you can buy high-quality tulip bulbs, which in spring will delight you with fast germination and beautiful flowering.
In order for the pre-purchased planting material not to deteriorate, it must be stored in a cool, dry room before planting. The cellar is perfect for these purposes. It is important that the place where the bulbs are stored has good air exchange, is ventilated, since the planting material in a hot, humid room can become unusable - moldy or deteriorate. Immediately after purchase, the bulbs are stored at a temperature of 18-20 ° C, later it is reduced to 14-16 ° C.
You should purchase planting material in specialized stores or from trusted distributors - there you will buy certified high-quality varietal material. But in the market it is easy to get caught on fraudulent sellers who will pass off the most ordinary bulbs as elite ones.
When choosing tulip bulbs, pay attention to their size classification. Bulbs of any size are suitable for planting flowers in open ground. If you purchase a culture for distillation, give preference to only elite varieties, buy extra-class varieties.
High-quality bulbs for planting should be heavy, dense in structure, covered with an even layer of brownish-golden scales, with pronounced tubercles of roots at the bottom and a dense neck. They should have at the end of the shoots of the future stem. Rotten, nailed, soft bulbs should never be used.
Selecting and preparing a landing site
For planting tulips, it is necessary to give preference to open, sunny, protected from gusts of wind territories. Pay attention to the soil composition of the place intended for the future flower bed - the soil must be sufficiently drained. And the landing site itself is leveled or with a slight slope. This is necessary for a better drainage of water - although the culture is moisture-loving, stagnation of liquid and groundwater is detrimental to its root system. Soaked bulbs are susceptible to fungal diseases, freezing in winter.
Fertile, loose loam and sandy loam, neutral or slightly alkaline, are best suited for growing tulips. Clayy heavy soil is also suitable for planting flowers, but only after mixing with peat, sand, humus.
Preparation of planting material
A prerequisite for good plant growth is careful selection and inspection of planting material. Inspect the bulbs before planting them. If you find it is rotten, moldy, or crumpled, dispose of it immediately. Diseased bulbs will not only not accept, but also infect neighboring crops and the soil composition of the site.
It is recommended to sort the planting material according to size before planting, so it will be easier for you to care for the flowers, and in the future to dig them out.
Before planting tulip bulbs, soak them for half an hour in a solution of potassium permanganate (0.5%) or other fungicides. There are also biological products specially designed for the preparation of planting material, for example, "Vitaros" or "Dachnik".
Planting tulip bulbs
The bulbs should be buried in the ground by two (for light soils) or three (for heavier soils) their heights, but not more than 18-20 cm. When planting, observe the distance between the bulbs. Most often it depends on their size and the nature of the landing. Planting material for annual flower beds is planted close to each other. For perennial plantings, it is necessary to maintain a distance between the specimens - this way the plants will receive more access to sunlight, and it will be easier to care for them. The planting interval should be about 10 cm between the bulbs themselves and 25 cm between the rows of the flower bed. Planting per 1 sq. m of land from 50 to 100 units, depending on the size of the material.
Do not under any circumstances damage the scales present on the surface of the planting material. They perform the function of protecting the plant from rodents. On the contrary, in order to further scare away pests, sprinkle the bulbs with hot ground red pepper.
Landing order:
- it is necessary to start planting tulips from earlier varieties to later ones;
- Prepare planting holes for each bulb in advance, and for planting more tulips, it is advisable to prepare a total area for planting at the required depth;
- to reduce the risk of infections and better air and water permeability, it is recommended to add a small amount of river sand to the bottom of the holes;
- Do not press the planting material forcibly into the ground to avoid damaging it - carefully place the bulbs and sprinkle with soil;
- water the crop.
After planting, tulips must be fed with mineral complex fertilizers intended for bulbous crops. It is allowed to introduce humus, ash, compost, as well as mixtures of nitrophoska or superphosphate into the soil.
It is impossible to feed the herbaceous culture with fresh organic substances - they can cause fungal diseases of the bulbs. Fresh manure, for example, attracts moles, earthworms and other underground inhabitants.
Use the recommendations given on the choice of bulbs, territory, deepening of planting material, and in the spring the flower bed on the site will delight you and all household members with an abundance of fresh bright tulips.
Do you plant tulips?
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