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AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



September, 1905 



The Autumn Bulb Planting 



By Leonard Gilbert 



]HE spring garden is very largely a bulb gar- 

 den. All that is delightful in it is the result 

 of planning the year beforehand. Next 

 year, when neighboring lawns are bright 

 with color, it will be too late to demand of 

 the florist ready-made, outdoor effects in 

 snowdrops and hyacinths. In beds newly spaded and mel- 

 lowed we plant many brown and white bulbs this month. 

 Let us plant thickly, that their blooming may be riotous and 

 really springlike; tastefully, that the effect may not be bar- 

 baric. Mixed bulbs are cheap, but their effect is even cheaper. 

 With known colors or named varieties we can plant in- 

 telligently and produce brilliant results. 



near the same size and planted nearly the same depth. The 

 deeper a bulb is planted the later it will bloom. Yet most 

 bulbs are planted too shallow for their well-being and well- 

 continuing. Unevenness or succession of bloom is a good 

 feature of colonies naturalized in the edges of woodlands; 

 but where the bloom of the bulbs is to be succeeded by relays 

 of other flowers, changes must be immediate and sweeping. 

 Patchiness of bloom can usually be avoided by carefully 

 choosing and planting. 



To a naturally sandy soil it is necessary to add merely a 

 little old, flaky leaf mold in order to make it congenial to 

 bulbs. Extra fertility is best supplied in the form of a mulch 

 of manure scattered over the beds after their surface has 



Attractive Effect Produced by the Unsymmetrical Planting Around a Fountain 



Perhaps it was the stiff, prim habit of the Dutch bulbs 

 which suggested and kept in use for them so long the formal 

 pattern beds in stars and circles and curlicues. Happily 

 these are now vanishing into the irregular, wavy lines used 

 to border walks, into naturalized masses and colonies, into 

 old-fashioned borders along beds of perennials. Often these 

 bright spring flowers are effective in emphasizing some 

 natural feature of the place, as when outlining a broken 

 mass of boulders, some steep slope or rocky ledge. 



Since, in most cases, bulbs planted near the house are to 

 be followed by other plants in summer, we plan to have the 

 flowers of a colony open simultaneously, selecting sorts that 

 bloom naturally about the same time. The bulbs should be 



stiffened with frost once or twice. Drainage must be good, 

 or water will collect about the bulbs in winter and cause them 

 to decay. If the center of the beds is slightly rounded up 

 toward the middle, after the bulbs are planted, it will help 

 toward shedding the winter rains. 



To clayey soils in which bulbs are to be planted some sand 

 is usually added. If they are firmly bedded in cushions or 

 layers of it, with more added atop, until their shapes are 

 entirely covered, they will keep sound and bloom well much 

 longer than bulbs carelessly thrust into unprepared beds with 

 a dibble or trowel. An inflexible rule in the culture of all 

 bulbs is that no fresh manure should ever be spaded into the 

 soil in which they grow. If trowel or dibble is used in 



