Planting Spring-Blooming Dutch Iris Bulbs
If you haven’t started planting your spring-blooming bulbs yet, try to get it done soon! Here in the Northeast, the temperatures are getting colder fast.
Planting these bulbs can be a a very labor intensive task. As many of you know, every autumn we plant thousands and thousands of bulbs at my farm. This week, my head gardener, Ryan McCallister, carefully planted rows and rows of Dutch iris bulbs in one of the beds of my new vegetable garden. These irises from Van Engelen Inc., a wholesale family-run flower bulb business in Bantam, Connecticut, are in shades of blue and purple and include varieties 'Silvery Sky,' 'Picasso,' 'Eye of the Tiger,' 'Pink Panther,' and 'Red Ember.'
Enjoy these photos.
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- Ryan wrote all the names on markers, so we could identify the flowers when they bloom in spring. Ryan repurposed some unused paint stirrers to make these, but plant markers can be found at all gardening shops.
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- I’ve been using Van Engelen Inc. as a bulb source for years. Van Engelen Inc., and its sister company John Scheepers, Inc. are located in the Litchfield, Connecticut borough of Bantam. Jo-Anne’s father, Jan Ohms, acquired the Van Engelen flower bulb company in the 1970s and created the first real wholesale flower bulb catalog available to private residences in the US. Jan then acquired John Scheepers in 1991 in order to keep his uncle’s flower bulb business in the family.
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- Among the varieties I selected for planting – Iris ‘Silvery Sky.’ This has beautiful periwinkle-blue standards and blue-tinged, white falls with yellow blotches. (Photo from VanEngelen.com)
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- Iris hollandica ‘Picasso’ has bright yellow falls with chocolate veins and shades of lavender and purple standards. (Photo from VanEngelen.com)
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- Another interesting Dutch iris is ‘Eye of the Tiger’ with its violet-blue standards and dark mahogany-bronze falls with yellow blotches. (Photo from VanEngelen.com)
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- This variety is called ‘Pink Panther.’ It is lavender-pink with a buttercup-yellow blotches on deeper magenta-pink etched falls. (Photo from VanEngelen.com)
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- And this one is ‘Red Ember’ – a more dramatic iris with bold purple-red standards and copper-terracotta falls accented with yellow blotches. (Photo from VanEngelen.com)
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- The bed was already fed with an all-purpose flower and vegetable continuous release fertilizer.
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- Ryan then uses garden twine to mark where the rows would be in the bed. Proper spacing is crucial in a flower cutting garden. Ryan figures out how many rows are needed for each variety, so the entire bed is well-utilized and the bulbs have ample room to grow.
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- Next, Ryan makes the rows using the bed preparation rake from Johnny’s Selected Seeds. This tool allows him to easily create furrows in the soil. Hard plastic red tubes slide onto selected teeth of the rake to mark the rows.
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- Here is the bed all ready for the bulbs.
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- The bags of bulbs are placed on the bed where they will be planted.
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- The coinciding markers are put down next.
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- Ryan places each of the bulbs six-inches apart in the row.
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- Bulbs should always be planted pointed end up. On many bulbs, it is very easy to see which end should be faced up. If it is planted upside down, the flower will still grow, but it will likely take longer.
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- Spacing the bulbs carefully takes a bit of time. On the right is a tape measure, so Ryan can be sure they are all planted equally spaced. We take a lot of photos of my gardens, so it is also important to plant everything properly, so I can share the most precise and beautiful photos with all of you.
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- For these Dutch iris bulbs, Ryan uses a dibber. A dibber or dibble or dibbler is a pointed wooden stick for making holes in the ground so seeds, seedlings or small bulbs can be planted. Dibbers come in a variety of designs including the straight dibber, T-handled dibber, trowel dibber, and an L-shaped dibber. This is a T-handled dibber.
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- Then, once all the bulbs are in their designated rows, Ryan pushes the dibber into the soil making a hole where the bulb will be planted.
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- Smaller bulbs can be planted about five-inches deep.
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- Here is the bulb in the soil.
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- Ryan plants all the bulbs before backfilling, so he can keep track of the planted holes and rows.
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- And then it’s time to rake this side of the bed. The other side will be done next. Dutch iris bulbs are planted around the same time as tulips and daffodils, so be sure to plan accordingly. These will look so beautiful when they bloom in spring – I can’t wait.
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