Guide to growing a flower bulb collection in an existing flower bed

Plant this flower bulb collection in your perennial bed and enjoy the splendor of color and spring joy even before the perennials come to life. One collection gives a maximum effect of about 1 square meter – perfect for creating a beautiful eye-catcher. Do you want to cover a larger area? Choose several collections for a magnificent effect, or spread the bulbs out for a more natural and airy feel. In an empty pallet collar or empty bed, we recommend more collections for extra fullness.

Planting principles:

1. Plant the spring bulbs behind the first row of perennials – never in front. This will hide the bulb buds when the perennials grow up. The effect will be best if the border plant is about 30–50 cm high and starts in early summer. Suitable border plants are, for example, lavender, Lavandula angustifolia, border nepeta, Nepeta x faassenii or geranium, Geranium.
2. Small bulbs up front – plant early flowering bulbs with small blooms far up front. They wilt before the perennials take off and can also be placed in front of the first row of perennials. Examples include crocus, snowdrop, Galanthus, meadowsweet, Fritillaria meleagris.
3. Large bulbs at the back – plant larger bulbs further back so that perennials hide the tops after flowering. For example tulip, Tulipa, narcissus, Narcissus. Tip! Among the large bulbs there are both early and late varieties – plant the early ones at the back and the late ones in front. This way the late varieties hide the early ones when they have bloomed over.
4. Fertilizer – bone meal in the fall when planting and blood meal in the spring.
5. Planting depth – about 3 times the height of the bulb. Better too deep than too shallow. The root system should be facing downwards, but for the smallest bulbs this is less important.
6. Location – preferably sunny, warm and well-drained. Daffodils tolerate wetter soil better than tulips.
7. Planning area – one collection is enough for approximately 1x1 m. For larger beds: supplement with more collections or plant more sparsely according to the principles above.

Planting plan

An example showing how the flower bulbs can be planted in a perennial bed that has a plant distance of 35 cm. Note: this is to illustrate the planting principles above and can only be followed exactly if you have a perennial bed like the illustration.

Other tips!

• Pinch off the flower when it has finished blooming and let the tops remain and wither.
• When the bulbs have finished blooming, you can fold down or braid the tops to hide them more in the flowerbed.
• For spring bulbs that are not quite deer-proof like tulips: Spray them with Trico garden or put up sticks with sheep's wool on them to protect against deer.
• Some bulbs reproduce by forming side bulbs, such as daffodils, snowdrops and lilies of the valley. They can be dug up and moved if you want to spread them out in the long term. If the daffodils stop blooming, you can dig them up, divide them and plant them deeper and more sparsely.
• For flower bulbs that are not recurring, we recommend digging them up after about the second year as the flowering usually decreases significantly after the first year and some of them do not come up again at all. If you are lucky, they may bloom again and therefore we do not usually dig them up after the first year.