Fertilizing flower bulbs (e.g., Daffodils)

9 years ago

I was listening to Ciscoe Morris' gardening radio show this morning, he was stating flower bulbs need a lot of fertilizer (he was talking about Daffodils), he said for his own he fertilizes them when they first come up and also when they start blooming and stressed they need a lot of fertilizer.

I have some daffodils that aren't blooming and want to start fertilizing to see if I can get those not blooming to start blooming.

Ciscoe wasn't specific about what kind of fertilizer whether dry or liquid and also what numbers fertilizer such as 0-10-10.

Any thoughts?

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Comments (3)

lilydude
9 years ago
In general, Dutch bulbs love lime. So I would start with that. After that, it gets murky. I have always had tremendous results with bone meal, which is high in Phosphorus (P). But there are expert growers who say that Potassium (K) is the key nutrient for Dutch bulbs and others. So I just sprinkle a little NPK fertilizer on when the foliage emerges. It may not be optimum, but it works great. Another reason to cut back on the P is that our soils in this area have plenty of P, according to the experts. And once you apply P, it tends to remain in the soil for a long time.

I don't agree with him about "a lot of fertilizer". Bulbs use nutrients very efficiently. Nitrogen in particular is bad for bulbs if used in excess. You could end up with excessive splitting, where you end up with lots of little bulbs that will take forever to get to bloom size. So don't use lawn fertilizer, which usually has a gigantic amount of Nitrogen. A 5-10-10 or 10-20-20 is OK if applied lightly. Or use the 12-0-12 which is recommended for this region.

If you are growing bulbs in heavy rich soil, the lime may be enough. In sandy soil, they require extra fertilizer. If they are happy, you will end up with big clumps of bulbs that will have to be divided, or they will stop blooming. By the way, tulips really love sandy soil. Daffodils will grow anywhere.

You really have to be careful when taking advice from celebrities. They tell you the bare minimum, just enough to fill up the space between commercials. And they don't like to talk about negative or complicated things. For example, if your daffs are looking weak, it may be that they are infested with Narcissus bulb fly. All the fertilizer in the world isn't going to solve that. It's really too bad, because daffs are pretty bulletproof otherwise. However, I have seen virus in daffs, especially in the cheap ones that the big box stores sell. It can show up as yellow stripes on the foliage. Fertilizer won't fix that either.

Keep in mind that tulips do not like wet soil in summer. Also, tulips are very attractive to rodents. Daffs don't have these issues.

Google it. There is lots of info out there.
Embothrium
9 years ago
Double post, please see below.

This post was edited by bboy on Sun, Feb 8, 15 at 12:40
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Embothrium
9 years ago
In this area nitrogen is the only major nutrient that is likely to become deficient on gardened soils. Everywhere people garden they need to watch that they don't overdo the phosphorus, some products are very high in it and it is effectively only able to be gotten rid of in an immediate and decisive way, once over-applied by digging out and replacing the soil.

When I had daffodils diminishing due to the attentions of narcissus bulb fly I dusted some lawn fertilizer on them and there was a huge improvement in size, density and flowering of the bulbs. After that it was "Flies? What flies?"

It takes a large amount of lime to change the pH of a soil even one point. If this change is undertaken during a short period of time it is hard on the soil micro-life.

Here is a link that might be useful: The Myth of Beneficial Bone Meal

Fertilizing flower bulbs (e.g., Daffodils)

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lilydude

Embothrium

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