Forcing Tulips By March 8 On "feather Beds" And "sheets"

2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38

If you want to please yourself, your family and friends with self-grown blooming tulips by March 8, then it's time to take care of this so that the bulbs have time to take root. What is needed in order to meet the spring holiday with delicate flowers?

Cooking a soft bed for tulip bulbs

First of all, it is necessary to acquire a convenient container and soil for planting bulbs, which will serve as a so-called "cradle" for future flowers.

The bed itself will be a container for distillation. The size and type of container depends on how many flowers you intend to get, and whether you are going to transplant them later. In order for the tulips to stand on the window, you can have several bulbs at once in one wide pot. If you are going to give tulips to someone, congratulate many women and need a large number of flowers, it is more convenient to plant them first in wide boxes, and then move the plants from them to pots with fresh soil. Wide pots, basins, and deep bowls are suitable for these purposes.

The container should be deep enough to accommodate at least 10 cm of soil, and preferably 12-15 cm, because the roots of the plants will be long and they need a nutrient medium. Therefore, boxes should be chosen with a height of approximately 25-30 cm.

The pot should also be rather big. But it doesn't have to be very high. Because when they are forcing a large number of tulips in several boxes, they are stacked on top of each other. And the sprouts should have a gap in height so that they have room to grow. And you don't have to place the pots in tiers on top of each other.

If the boxes are loosely knocked down and have wide slots through which the soil spills out, it can be covered with any suitable "breathable" material. For example, a newspaper, a bag of sugar, a vegetable net or agrofibre - which is at hand.

Rooting soil will serve as a so-called "mattress". This "feather bed" should be light and nutritious at the same time. A good composition is 2 parts of earth and one part of sawdust. Such a mixture will be quite loose and retain moisture well. If the earth has an acidic reaction, it is worth adding a little dolomite flour or ash.

Well, to make the bulbs as comfortable as possible, cover the mattress with a thin sheet of sand - a layer of 2-3 mm. Before “covering the mattress with a sheet,” the soil must be spilled. After that, moisten the sand itself. Then we proceed to placing the bulbs in the boxes in rows.

Preparing the bulbs for forcing

But before you put the tulip bulbs for distillation, they need to be prepared. The complex of measures includes peeling, separation of children, rejection of diseased specimens.

If there is slight damage, they should be cleaned, allowed to dry, and pickled before planting. But it is better to plant such defective tulips in a separate box, and not together with other healthy flowers. Well, the kids can grow up.

Laying tulip bulbs in the "bed" for distillation

The disembarkation should be tight. In a row, the bulbs should sit close to each other, at a distance of approximately 0.5-1 cm. Between the rows, make a gap of about 2 cm wide.

Take a good look at the bulbs before planting. If they have a convex "belly" and a concave "back", try to place them so that their "tummies" are facing in the same direction. After that, you need to cover the bulbs with a layer of earth - cover with a "blanket". And spill it well with water again.

Then remove the boxes for three months in a dark, ventilated rooting room. Rooting occurs at a temperature of about +7? C … + 9? C, but not higher. From time to time it is necessary to check whether the soil in the boxes is dry. On average, no more than three additional waterings are made during this time. And in February, the temperature begins to increase so that by March the plants will begin to bloom.