If you want to grow in soil, plant the bulb in soil right from the start. Growing in water is the whole idea of this method, hence the pretty vases. Water growing is not intended as a precursor to soil growing. After the bloom is over you can plant the bulb out in the garden.

Your bulbs from Royal Colors will have been stored previously under cool conditions and will be ready to go. Modern hybrids do not need to be chilled or forced into dormancy to flower. However, in winter, a cool rest in a brightly lit environment seems to do them well, in terms of setting their annual cycle. Some people do that to try to time their blooming. Some follow those directions because of reading that that is what you have to do and the instructions are more related to what they go through during commercial production. If you have to lift your bulbs from the ground each year, then the drying off followed by cool storage would perhaps be the way to go, so that will hopefully rest and not bloom till they are planted back in the soil. The problem is keeping them in storage for so long a time at home, It requires the right temperature (around 41F to hold them for the longest time)and with some humidity in the air around them. I rest mine in winter, but not at very cool temperatures and they all bloom later in winter to spring. I just cut back on water and stop feeding. I let them go dryish for as long as possible due to lack of good light indoors. They may or may not lose all foliage, but if I cut them back completely when they are dry, they will rest that way. At those prices, I agree, the had better be top quality! Robert.

You do have a special situation. On a hot balcony in zone 10. Hmm. For the soil to remain cool in a heat trap a large pot is needed. If you use plastic and the sun hits it the soil temperature is going to be inhospitable to bulbs. For daffodils I would try a 16 inch deep one, preferably unglazed clay (needs more frequent watering than glazed). If all I had was plastic I would find a way to shield the sides from the sun's rays. What confuses me is your saying they are still a little green, just starting to die off. Daffodil foliage ripens by June and they are dormant all summer. Are you very sure you have daffodils? Can you take a picture of the foliage? I think the only green foliage bulbs I have right now are nerine, dahlias, rain lilies and lilies.

I love bulbs! I used to plant hundreds of them every year and was the only person around who had large bulb plantings. Here's what I learned about bulbs in our warm climate. Tulips, crocus and hyacinth need a good fast draining soil that holds moisture. In nature they get snowmelt and like to grow in sandyish soil that has plenty of decomposed organic (leaves) material. They love top quality potting soil and like pots but not if the pot gets too hot from the sun. They do well under leafless trees, part sun or morning sun areas. Getting too warm makes the flowers open too fast and also they won't last as long as ones that don't get blasted by the sun or dry wind. Timing is everything. Plant a few batches every 5-7 days so if the weather is bad one week, you still have another group flowering later on. They won't be back the next year so it's up to the weather as far as how the flowers look. If you plant in pots and it's going to be hot and blowing, you can move them to a protected shady spot until it passes by. These bulbs need minimum 6_8weeks of chill in the refrigerator. You need to get rid of all apples, onions and any other fruit in the fridge or the ripening gasses will cause your bulbs not to flower. Store them in a paper bag marked with the removal date. As long as they aren't getting rot, you can store them in there. As soon as you remove them and plant, they will start growing. I like to dip mine in a fungicide and let them dry before chilling. Otherwise keep checking for rot. Someone else uses sulfur dust. I never tried it. If you don't chill or chill enough, the flowers come on short stems and maybe no stems and are small. Chilling again never worked for me. Sometimes they come back for a second year in the ground if you're lucky. Martha Stewart showed how she planted her pots and put the whole thing in the refrigerator and they grew slowly in there giving them a head start. I don't have an extra refrigerator for that. I know some growers do that and use a large florists walk in cold room set to the perfect temperatures. Daffodils in So.CA can do well but some types are better than others. All the experts agree that to come back they need to dry out in the summer. Especially the tricky ones. I have some that get summer water and still come back but mostly they are the small spray types and also paperwhites which multiply well in good garden soil. Some of the big showy yellow and white daffies won't come back. You replant them like tulips and they need chilling in the fridge. They want cool temps and part sun or bright shade under a leafless tree. Dec. - Feb is the best time temperature wise but Descanso in La Canada near Pasadena plants for Easter and some years the weather is with them and some years everything fries in the heat. January is a safe bet and I like to stagger plantings to bloom until early March. Some tulips can take warmer temps than others and suppliers will indicate which ones will. Daffodils and Hyacinths aren't as fussy. Paperwhites are reliable blooming exactly so many weeks ( I forget how many) after planting and daffodils seem to bloom around Feb. when they are established in the ground. It seems like they are always a few weeks ahead of the tulip displays at Descanso unless someone has planted a group in pots or to coincide with tulips in the beds. Crocus is great because the bulbs are small so you can be planting them continuously out of the fridge in pots or in the ground. The little pots fit on windowsills and are easy to move around. Hyacinths are also nice on a windowsill. Freesias are easy. Plant and Mark where they are so you don't disturb them. Ranunculus can be tricky from a dry tuber. They don't want too much water after planting until they are growing well. I have heard that soaking before planting in a weak kelp and diluted liquid fertilizer and then planting in a Sandy mix to prevent rotting helps. My clay soil rots these bulbs so I add sand, planting mix and horse manure when I plant them. I notice when I buy them already started, the soil mix is light and fluffy. After they finish blooming, you need to pull them and let them dry out or they can rot away in the soil. They always rotted for me no matter how much sand I added. I like the biggest plants I can find. The larger the tuber, the more flowers you will get and the longer flowering period you will enjoy. The packs with teeny dry tubers are hard to start and the plants don't give many flowers in that first year. If someone is getting these to return every year in the same area undisturbed, please share your experience here. I have even tried letting them dry out in pots and then watering again in fall but they don't return. Someone said don't let them go to seed, it weakens the tubers.