The message
from Sacha contains these words:

Janet Baraclough26/11/03 5:13


The message
from Sacha contains these words:

We're just getting round to putting in tulip bulbs now. BTW, has anyone
else heard/read/known that burying them about 8" deep makes them display
better year after year?

Yes, but having tried it, I don't believe it :-) Whatever I do, my
tulips never last more than a few years in wet acid soils. Might be
different in drier areas, or limey soils perhaps.

Janet.
So do you lift them every year?

I have in the past before I tried the deep-planting wheeze; and I've
tried planting them in containers, and in raised beds in the veg garden
just for cutting for the house. Now I've just resigned myself to their
short lifespan with me. At least they are pretty cheap, and it's an
excuse to try somethng new each time. This autumn I've planted Estella
Rijnfeld.

At our last place I tried to have red tulips naturalised in grass
among the white narcissi in the wildflower meadow, but that was a total
failure because they were in the deer zone and got scoffed as soon as
they appeared. I think I've read since that Prince Charles "naturalised"
meadow tulips at Highgrove are replanted regularly.

Janet.