Update, Spring 2011 All is well in the pieris patch this year! Last year I deadheaded leftover blooms from 2009 and I gave all the pierises plentiful compost. I may also have added some Plantone, I'm not sure. I got a little giddy with Plantone. I moved a few of the dwarf pierises to give them some more room and I pruned reverting branches from two of the three Little Heaths. P. Mountain Fire on April 9, 2011 The Cavatine and maybe a Prelude also bloomed but I don't have a good photo. Little Heath is becoming a real joy. Of the three, I left one alone, moved a second one with light pruning of reversions, and heavily pruned a third. The one I left alone bloomed heavily. The second one that was moved also bloomed heavily, just later, and the one I heavily pruned didn't bloom at all. This is the Little Heath I left alone, on May 4, 2011 with new red foliage appearing with blossoms remaining. There's a piece of Cavatine (I think) showing on the left. The red or pink foliage was like a second bloom this spring. This is some of the pierises on May 18, 2011 with a Euonymus Silver King and a big old Ilex verticillata as backdrop. I think that's Cavatine and maybe a Prelude on the lower right still blooming. The overall bloom time was really extended well over a month. There was much more snow cover than usual last winter (usually we get minimal cover) so that may have helped. In any case, the problem seems to have been transient, or maybe I now know a better way of maintaining the plants Claire.

Sure, go ahead and divide them and space them out taking care to damage them as little as possible. The bulbs that grow may not be as large as ones grown from individual cloves planted in the fall. However, they will be much larger than what would grow if the clumps are left undivided.

Hi Manur83. Thanks for taking the time to reply. They have been 2 summers without blooms, hopefully this, their 3rd year. I suspect we have been impatient. My wife says they came in small containers and they weren't very big in spring of '15 when they were planted but they grew nicely. Last summer (their 2nd) they were a little taller, nice green leaves, healthy looking but no sign of buds or flowers. Like you say, maybe they were focusing on growth and we've probably been expecting too much. This spring, now, the leaves look very healthy AND we have buds. Making progress :-). Fertilizing...each spring, just as most stuff is starting to come up, we give all plants a healthy dose of bone meal which apparently is very high in phosphorous. But I'm sort of torn whether to fertilize any more. Did go to Endless summer web site and they recommend a high phosphorous fertilizer for "BloomStruck" late spring early summer. We gave them Bone Meal early spring. I don't know whether to give them another shot of fertilizer or not, now or later in the season...or what to give them. I'm thinking, maybe some rose food 18-24-16 in about 3 weeks... High in phosphorous with some iron. But not sure. If you or others have thoughts on this, would like to hear them! We have Annabelle's in 3 locations in our yard, and they do fantastic with nothing but Bone Meal in the Spring and water. The ES plant's card says to "keep soil evenly moist" whatever that means. So keeping an eye on that making sure the soil doesn't get dry. We are hopeful of getting flowers this year, would be nice. Thanks for your comments.

A few years ago (2016) I planted some allium bulbs. They were allium Giganteum, allium Gladiator, allium Purple sensation, alllium Mount Everest and allium sphaerocephalon. I planted them in October. The next year all of them flowered except for a. sphaerocephalon. I thought it needed some time to establish. I let them go to seed. This year, only a few Purple sensation flowered, no signs of any white Mount Everest, no signs of Giganteum nor Gladiator. Sphaerocephalon hasn't flowered yet. I fear they are lost. Could it be they are dormant this year? Did they die off? I also bought a. moly, a. caeruleum and a. oreophilum last year and planted them in late fall (December) as the soil was workable and no freezing temperatures. This spring only a few of them flowered although I planted 10 of each. As with my alliums I always leave leaves on, never tear them off. I live in a city so no special animals. No voles nor mice. There are a lot of slugs, though. I have a sandy loam, neutral soil. Climate is something between oceanic and Mediterranean with hot (sometimes dry sometimes humid) summers and dry winters with the lowest temp. - 12 degrees C (around 11 F). (I won't post any photos because this is the third time I am posting this so something is apparently glitched.) Thanks for replies in advance