WOW! I am so glad that I am not the only one! LOL! I bought some tulip bulbs last fall, and I was going to plant them in containers. However, I never got round to doing that. I left the bulbs in the unheated (but insulated) garage, which was in the mid 30's to low 40's during winter. About a month ago, I planted the bulbs in some containers, and now they are sprouting very well in the garage! My questions are: 1. When will it be safe to take the containers outside? It can still go to low 30's here at night. 2. How likely are they going to bloom this year, given that the bulbs were chilled in the garage? I am quite surprised by how well they are sprouting! Thanks!

Oops - just re-read the posts in more detail. I did plant late, so I guess it's possible the ground froze before they sprouted this year. Planted late last year too, though, but it might have stayed warmer longer. As for now, it's still frozen if you go down a few inches, but not super hard. I would have thought they'd be trying to push up if my Narcissus are already doing that, but maybe not... Well, we'll see.....

Daniella - I'm trying to follow the advice - keep them root bound. I don't want to up them to pots. But some are in those clear cups - and a couple are almost all roots - they wilt if they're not given water every two days. (at 72-75 degrees) - to me - that's telling me - oh ohhhhhhhh - need more pot room. Here's one for you gurus out there. Soem are in dark green tumbler cups, and others int he cheaper clearish cups. Not that I haven't lost some in the clear ones - but the roots - and those in the "clearish" cups - seem to be doing better. Does that have something to do with the roots receiving some light? It's just something I'm noticing. Is it just a coincidence? There are those int he green cups doing ok - but right now - as they're trying to get going - it seems the "clearish" cups - those are doing better.

Well, I kinda like the "Lots of Love" idea. Heh. That year I had such great success with my candy onions -- actually great success with ANY onion -- I did something that I don't know if it helped or not. I soaked them in Jerry Baker's "Root Revival Tonic": 1 tbsp of mild dish soap, 1/4 cup of strong tea and 1 tbsp epsom salt, mixed well into 1 gallon of water. This is from his book, "Old-Time Gardening Wisdom". I had used it to soak some bushes I was planting and instructions said up to 24 hours. I didn't soak the onions in it but about an hour. They made the water really "onioney" and I was worried I'd made a big mistake. But I set them out right away and those were the best and biggest onions I'd ever grown. I also didn't set them out till April 15, the approximate date of our last frost. We got a frost after that and I went out and covered them all. What concerns me is that sometimes the frost will cause the onions to think they've had another winter, and that triggers bolting to seed. Last year, I didn't soak the onions. I put the ones I got from Dawn out immediately, which was sometime in early March, I think. And then I planted Southern Belle Red later on. Of course it was a weird year and so hard to judge because of that. Got some decent-sized onions from Dawn's plants, but nothing like the previous year, others stayed small and a few of them went to seed. The Southern Belles that were planted later didn't bolt to seed but they didn't grow any, either. I dug them back up and will be planting them around April 15 to see if they'll go ahead and do anything. This year, whatever I end up getting, I'm going to try the soak again, and wait till April 15. I know this goes against standard practice, but it did work for me that one year. Maybe I was just having "Dumb cluck luck". We'll see what happens.