There are said to be tulip varieties that have a better chance of blooming for more than just the first spring after planting bulbs. The link is to article showing varieties that are considered best chance for return blooms and the list is consistent among vendor catalogues and articles I've read. It also has tips on how to help bulbs perform at their best such as planting deeper than recommended (may bloom later than normal) and making sure to keep area dry outside of growing/bloom time. I'm sticking with Giant Darwin Hybrids (old "Darwin Hybrids" seem to have gone away?) and Triumph Tulips this year. Last year was my first and other fancier varieties didn't perform well if at all. I also plant equal number in containers for lack of space to make amended gardens in clay soil with too much root competition. Learned the hard way (rotted bulbs) that I have to plant them in mix of pea gravel and potting soil and definitely NOT anything with "moisture retention" as feature for potting soil. Last year (my first) I had visions of color & bloom time coordination of different bulb varieties. Found out mother nature varies growing conditions and bulb hardiness each year both where most are grown/harvested (Holland) and in our own gardens. I think most people are so tired of winter blues, cold and snow in temperate climates they're just glad to see anything bloom with some color. Many people remember seeing things in their childhood they'd like to bring back and then expand upon. My father always grew about 20 red and yellow tulips for my late mother and he always took us to the store to pick out potted hyacinths which we gave her for Easter and/or Mother's Day. Even if I didn't have that memory of hyacinths I'm hooked on their fragrance so I've gotten 30 more to make a little quasi rock garden for them since the amended clay still doesn't drain very well on its own. Last year I went a little crazy and ended up buying more bulbs from Home Depot & Lowes (box stores) after having ordered quite a few from mail order sources. Some of both mail order and box store bulbs bloomed and some didn't but it was so long ago in "garden time" I've lost track. Think it really had as much to do with how and where I planted them than just quality of bulbs. Follow recommended planting/site facts and you'll have your best chance of blooming bulbs in spring and even some tulips returning in future years. Bulbs other than tulips can and do perennialize by multiplying in the best cultural site. Stick to more of those to start with and make a smaller number of tulips your centerpiece of the planting arrangement. Start where you can afford it and, if you like it, add a few things each year as finances allow. Also, be prepared that the photos you see in catalogues or online are much fuller with blooms than if you plant according to recommended spacing. That allows for things like daffodils & muscari you ordered to multiply and fill in as years pass. That was surprise to me in first year when they looked awfully sparse for number of bulbs I'd planted with things like muscari, crocus and other small bulbs. You've gotten great advice from experienced people on this forum. With that and tips for best chance to have tulips bloom for a few years you just have to prepare a good planting spot, dig, plant and wait for the color next spring. If you have deer or rabbits you might want to get a critter repellant spray because once the foliage starts to pop up these critters will start eating it. You might even think there was something wrong with the bulbs they're so good at it...LOL. You can find any number of deer/rabbit repellant sprays at Walmart, Home Depot, Lowes or any place like that near you. Good luck with your bulbs and think of the pleasure you'll have come spring while your digging and planting. Here is a link that might be useful: Getting Tulips to Last

Coming from Fl., spring bulbs are new to me. So I spent this past spring and summer seeing what I had. The former owner of the house had stuff ALL over the place. Daffodils all over the place. After they bloomed and the foliage wilted, I dug up most of them and massed them in two tight beds in front of my front porch. The tulips were in two tight beds in an area out under a big sickamore tree out front. Deep purple. BEAUTIFUL! I didn't touch these. About 30 in each group. Then Two big areas of giant Assulym(SP?)Big beautiful heads on long ,strong stems. But they smell like onions!! After they did their thing and the foliage wilted they got dug up and moved to surround a red maple up on the hill about 150' from the house not far from the road. They can do their thing up there. And then I had glads ALL over the place. Mostly out in the bed by the sickamore tree. One good thing, they were all the same kind. A little over a week ago the foliage was yellow enough to cut and move most of them. I mass planted them in front of the sickamore bed. Didn't have the first lilly or irises of any kind. So I went on a hunting and digging mission. There is an OLD abandoned general store on a side road about a mile from the house that has all kinds of plants around it. Saved myself a LOT of money. Got about 20 light purple bearded irises. At least 200 yellow-orange lillys. About a dozen orange wild butterfly plants. Plus I got six cittings from a beautiful hardy hydrania(SP?)bush. All six have rooted and are in one gal. pots under my oak tree out back. And then I ordered from Spring Hill and Brecks. Not a bunch. Just enough to see what their products are like. From SH I ordered the reblooming German irises (12), and a big bunch of cone flowers. The irises came last week. VERY big and healthy. Already planted them. Will receive the cone flowers early spring. From Brecks I ordered The giant lilly collection. I have the perfect place for them out back by my workshop. And all of this from a ROSE freek! I figure it will take about two or three yrs for everything to come together (about 75 to 100 roses bushs of all types along with everything else). I won't have a big "formal" garden. Just an easy flow garden. I moved up to the N.GA. mountains to retire (well kind of semi. I do a little side work on MY terms) and I plan on enjoying it. After a working life of Drywall hanging, finishing and texturing I can sit back, smile and say, "Thank you Lord."

I missed the sales last fall on e-bay from Blue Ridge because it was too late for planting here at that time. I do remember seeing them and the savings were increadable. I just ordered later for spring. One I bought on the Lily Auction but the rest I bought off the Blooming Auction. I rarely ever go look at the Blooming Auction but I wanted some Selman intros so I went and looked. I actually could not resist any of the ones I choose. But its like spring and summer, I never look at the Lily Auction because I am not interested in buying. I get in trouble during the late fall up to christmas, which is when I buy. Last year I had redone all the driveway side yard, put in the terraces and the upstairs garden were I have my Korth daylilies and it was so very much work to get everything planted. Pretty much the only thing that got more or less done daylily wise, was the driveway sideyard garden. The terraces garden and the upstairs garden are getting or did get many more daylilies this spring. But its all getting there. The newest one is the planter box terrace in the front yard and that actually will be totally done, planted with daylilies and lily bubs, this spring. Last year I felt like I would never get done and this year is worse even thought I planted twice as many daylilies last spring (not to mention I got MORE in the fall) but I got the iris crazies and added 36 Siberian Iris. I got started with the bulb lily crazies last year but nothing like this year were I have gone completely off the deep end. The reason is that I could because I had all the daylilies in place along the driveway sideyard and could plant and add lily bulbs in there this spring. The pond in ground project last fall gives me an opportunity to put in a new bed in front of the rockwork that defines the "woodsey area" in back and of course makes for more work, almost nothing is done there but 3 Siberian Iris planted. Lots of plans in my head so you know in afew months there will be pictures. Plus I need to plant all my annuals, most of which I have not even bought yet. And I need to do a new bed for all the Bearded Iris I have already ordered that ship in July. Have lots of daylilies still left to plant and have not finished planting all my lily bulbs, have only one poor rose that I bought this spring and its not planted yet either. Have wayyy to much to do but I have never been as pleased with my garden than I am this spring :-))

Sure, no exact science here...just tried a concoction and it works...you probably could alter it or dilute it. I take a one quart container ( kind from Chinese restaurants for soup is actually what I use). I put in two whole raw eggs, scrambled up ( I dont' think size matters, but I use Jumbo)..then I add several cloves of garlic, peeled and slightly smashed to the eggs. I then put in a quarter cup of Frank's Hot Sauce..add a sprinkle of garlic powder for good measure and fill the rest with cool water. I let this mixture steep on the counter ( ie: unrefridgerated) for at least an hour..up to a month( just shake it if it separates)..(it's never lasted longer than a month because I use it..but if it did I would still use it as is. When I am ready to use it..I take another quart container and a fine seive and strain the mixture into the second container ( so the mix doesn't clog the sprayer). I then add it to the one quart sprayer that I get at Wal*Mart or someplace inexpensive..like a buck.. I leave it out for when I want to spray. I spray it after a heavy watering, or heavy rain. It lasts quite some time. It makes me want Buffalo wings, but the odor disipates after a little while. If you use it too much you will notice it gets a little stinky. I find I don't need to soak the plant..just spritz a few of the leaves...I obviously can't guarantee this. It has left some spotting on some of the foliage..not all though. I wouldn't use it in direct hot sunlight and not on edibles..but that is just me. I find it especially useful for my viburnums over the winter when they eat the buds that formed, and in the early spring when they tend to eat everything tasty as it comes fresh from the spring earth..ie: tulips and such. Like I said, I just kinda guessed and made this up. I have tried so many other things ( my sleep shirts hanging on the shrubs overnight for human scent, human hair from the hairdressers: which worked really well too, but a pain and sometimes I find it gross, Irish Spring soap in stockings, predator urine...really gross, etc ) and this spray has worked consistantly for nearly two seasons....I started with it April 10 of last year....I remember the date because I was so upset that the deer ate all my tulips and everything down to the ground. So I concocted this and started spraying it. I found that they left things alone..a week...two weeks..month...etc...This year I have lost only two leaves from a Casa Blanca Lily ( rabbits and I am sure I did not spray all the leaves, especially the ones close to the ground.) They ate only the tips of two leaves and the lilies bloomed just fine a few weeks ago. I have tons of lilies...so for me, a little stinky wing sauce smell is more than worth it. I also lost a few nibbles from a hardy geranium Splish Splash...which I probably didn't spray because I've never seen anything bother them. It actually did me a favor...and rebloomed, ha ha ha. I have thousands of plants here....5 gardens in the front. I use maybe 1/2 the mixture on all of the gardens in total..just a light spritzing, takes all of ten minutes. If I happen to see deer, I may spray just to be sure the scent is fresh, although I am pretty confident that it works pretty well even if applied three weeks in the past. We haven't gotten much rain here at my house, and I haven't had to spray lately. Oh, yeah, I spritz new growth too..if is putting on new foliage or buds I'll give them a spritz. I concentrated on the front gardens and forgot some roses and daylilies I had planted in the backyard, the deer reminded me and promptly ate the blooms, so I sprayed them after that and they haven't bothered them since. It just reminds me not to get forgetful, they are there even though they may not be eating my sprayed gardens. I know, you just asked for the recipe...I just really am happy with having gardens to die in the drought. They never made it that far, ha ha ha. The well guy just left, we have to drill....fun, fun, fun... Hope it works for you, and good luck! JoAnn