The 'Renegade Late Bulb Planter'
When you move house you face the sad fact that many of your cherished possessions will be left behind, buried in the garden.
That nice little drift of alliums that you established can’t be hoiked out of the beds in July and re-inserted at your new gaffe. Although the thought does occur. And it’s never a good idea to offend the people moving into your house by presenting them with a rear garden that looks like Chelsea the week after it closed.
On the plus side of the equation, you can be pleasantly surprised by things that spring up in your new location. One of these serendipitous surprises was a gorgeous crocus-that-thought-it-was-an-iris and turned out to be Iris reticulata.
Once identified I was keen to find out more and my immediate point of reference was bulb specialists Avon Bulbs – winner of 27 RHS Chelsea Gold Medals. Not because the owners, Chris and Caroline, know a thing or two about bulbs, (which they clearly do), simply because they had the misfortune of going to the same college as me.
On their website they have three varieties of Iris reticulata – ‘Gordon’, ‘Harmony’ (as above) and the beautiful purple ‘J.S. Dijt’ (which sounds like it was named after a Dutchman with very little romance in his soul). In the corner of the picture was a flash that read. ‘Out of Season’.
Chris explained patiently: “These Iris are planted in the autumn to flower the following spring. So people can physically order them any time from the end of May and they’ll be delivered in September /October.”
‘Out of Season’ doesn’t really bother me. Okay, so they’re technically an autumn-planted bulb. But then again so are tulips and narcissi. ‘Old Maurice’ of the Woodstock Lane Garden Centre always used to tell me that I could plant bulbs after Christmas if I wanted and last year I put in over 150 tulip bulbs on January 21st with no ill effect.*
This year through a combination of hesitation and sloth – and a bit of waterlogging - I failed to get my 100 alliums in the ground. They went in on Sunday 22nd February. So I am fast gaining the moniker of renegade late bulb planter, pushing the boundaries of horticultural practice, the Heston Blumenthal of tulip insertion as I'd like to think. Or, as my wife pointed out, “more like one of the Chuckle Brothers”.
Now whether or not the alliums turn out to be a disaster, we have yet to find out, but I’ll keep you posted.
*and people love seeing tulips in August
