Over the Garden Fence: Striking 'gold' in the garden

After a night with limited sleep, my head spins. In the latest bout it spun in technicolor. It was pleasant but way out of the realm of reality. Or maybe not.

It may have had its beginnings two weeks ago when I was digging a hole to plant a cardinal plant. The shovel struck "gold" in the form of daffodil bulbs. Kneeling down beside the hole where the bulbs were surrounded by loosened soil, my gloved hands kept rolling out bulbs. They were good-sized. There were an amazing total 32 bulbs in this harvest.

When the daffodils are planted my usual method of operation is to place eight bulbs in a hole. This presents a pleasant clump of color come spring. Four, maybe five years ago this was done. It is clear that this bulb reproduced well. It had increased to four times the original amount. It should not have surprised me, yet it did.

Right now companies are encouraging us to place orders for fall bulbs. Knowing that daffodil bulbs will multiply makes them appealing. Yet, this is the time when tulips with a wider range of color call to me. Ripping reds, bright oranges, pinks, blues and purples call out from catalog pages. You have heard me complain about the local deer populations which consume tulips as buds are set.

Orange, red, purple, and technicolor daffodils, too

On this day with so little sleep, my mind ponders a thought, one filled with excitement. What if somewhere in the world hybridizers were coming up with daffodils possessing predominantly orange, red and purple hues. Currently daffodils come with orange cups, reddish ones and definitely pink while holding on to their yellow and white perianths. Technicolor thoughts unfold solid red, pink, blue and purple daffodils. Wonderful. Bushels would be ordered to spite the deer who have no taste for them.

Alas, my bubble of imagination with a wider range of daffodil colors on an order form, burst. Back now in reality I can seek daffodil bulbs with red outlining on cups, or pink and apricot and nearly orange cups. There are several white, totally white daffodils.

Hybridizers work for years to open the field of color and other form features like ruffling and doubling of petals in spring flower bulbs. In the case of tulips, you have to wonder if there would be anything that could be introduced to deter critter munching. There is something that draws deer to the tulip family but drives them away from daffodils.

Until that changes we take our chances by ordering then planting existing colors of daffodils and tulips and trying to protect them. Maybe I should be grateful that squirrels and chipmunks have not laid waste to our bulbs.

Mary Lee Minor is a member of the Earth, Wind and Flowers Garden Club, an accredited master gardener, a flower show judge for the Ohio Association of Garden Clubs and a former sixth grade teacher. 

This article originally appeared on Bucyrus Telegraph-Forum: Daffodil bulbs offer a pleasant surprise