Some of our favourite bulb combinations to Elevate Your planting scheme
Well as I am writing this, summer has definitely ended and autumn is upon us. Some of us may be quite sad to say goodbye to the warmer weather as we prepare our gardens for winter.
One thing we can get excited about though is planning a good selection of bulbs to plant in our gardens and now is the time to do that!
We always include a bulb schedule for the gardens that we design as we feel this really elevates a planting scheme. Bulbs can greatly extend the seasons of interest within a garden, some bulbs flower as early as January/ February and others will flower all the way through autumn.
Make sure to order your bulbs soon as some popular choices do sell out. We have arranged a special discount code for you with our preferred supplier GeeTee bulbs, use NNGD10 for a 10% discount on your bulb order this year at www.gee-tee.co.uk (Can be used with any orders over £25, discount cannot be used in conjunction with other offers)
Nectaroscordum siculum
Ornithogalum 'Sochi' with Persicaria 'Purple Fantasy' in our East London Urban Oasis Garden
We’re a landscape and garden design studio in North London creating distinctively layered, harmonious residential design projects in London and beyond. In this blog we cover spring/ summer bulb selections to :
Help you extend the seasons of interest in your garden
Planting advice for bulbs
Bulbs for pollinators
Favorite bulb combinations
Special discount code for you to use at GeeTee bulbs
Early bulbs to ease your garden into spring
Adding in some gorgeous early flowering bulbs to your planting scheme will brighten up your garden and bring joy, often flowering before other plants have started to put on a show, they signal the arrival of spring and can offer valuable, much needed nectar to pollinating insects.
Spotlight on Fritillarias for early, elegant flowers
There are many bulbs that will add early colour to your garden, here are some of our favourite Fritillarias. Most of these will flower around April and are quite underused in our view. Fritillaria persicaria and Fritillaria persicaria ‘Ivory Bells’ are striking and bold choices while Fritillaria meleagris ‘Alba’ and Fritillaria uva-vulpis are more delicate, happily nodding amongst grasses and perennials that have just started to put on new growth.
Fritillaria persicaria 'Ivory Bells'
100cm, sun/ semi-shade, moist, flowering April. Pollinators love these!
Gorgeous paired with other darker Fritillarias or as the star of the early show.
Fritillaria meleagris 'Alba'
30cm, semi-shade, moist, flowering April
A delicate nodding flower, happy in woodland edge or growing through other plants and grasses.
Fritillaria persicaria
100cm sun/ semi-shade, moist, flowering April.
Striking and bold choice with dark purple/ almost black pendulous flowers.
Here come the tulips
As we move further into spring and everything is bursting into life, Tulips start to shine with all their vibrant colours putting on a show. There are so many gorgeous Tulips to choose from it can be hard to know where to start…
Some of the best Tulips combinations
The Dark purple of Tulipa ‘Queen of night’ paired with the bright orange Tulipa ‘Ballerina’ is a fabulous combination. Another favourite of ours is Tulipa viridiflora ‘Spring Green’ a creamy white Tulip with a green stripe. We also love Tulipa ‘Kansas Proud’ below, with its rich velvety shades of pink/ purple with a white base, held on upright stems. Another more unusual favourite is Tulipa ‘Turkestanica’, this is a species Tulip that will naturalise if left to go to seed so don’t dead head after flowering if you would like them to spread. Tulip turkestnica is white and yellow with very open abundant flowers growing to around 20cm tall. These Tulips will return year after year whereas other Tulip varieties tend not to.
Tulipa 'Queen Of Night'
60cm, moist but well drained, full sun, flowering April/ May
Beautiful paired with Tulipa 'Ballerina' for a striking combination or 'Kansas Proud' for an elegant, rich duo.
Tulipa 'Kansas Proud'
45cm, moist but well drained. Full sun/ semi-shade. Flowering April/ May
Tulipa 'Ballerina'
50cm, moist but well drained, full sun, flowering April/ May
Wonderful zesty pairing here with Euphorbia x martini
Alliums and other summer flowering bulbs
Alliums are a big a varied group taking many forms, sizes and colours so you’re sure to find one that you love. Alliums don’t tend to get eaten by squirrels, deer or other rodents but bees and butterflies love them. Most Alliums tend to return year after year and some will naturalise.
A few of our favourite Alliums
Alliums generally prefer to be in a sunnier location but some of them I have found to tolerate semi-shade as well where they will thrive with a few hours of sun each day, especially Allium amplectens ‘Graceful Beauty’. The seed heads of many Alliums are often attractive and can be left standing through autumn and into winter. Another beautiful summer flowering bulb is Nectaroscordum siculum which has lovely green pendulous flowers with purple stripe, pollinators adore them and the flowers fold up as they mature into seed heads.
Allium 'Red Mohican'
90cm, well drained, full sun, bees love these! flowers June/ July.
Tall Allium for middle of the border, unusual for being red and an interesting shape.
Allium cernum
30cm. moist well drained, full sun, flowers June/ July
Great in pots or naturalised on lawn edges or growing amongst shorter ornamental grasses.
Allium 'Graceful Beauty'
30cm, moist well drained, full sun/ semi-shade, flowers May/June
Love this Allium with white petals and contrasting purple stamens. Lovely in pots gently arching over the edge, or growing through ornamental grasses. Loved by bees and butterflies.
Planting & caring for your bulbs
Bulbs should be planted between October and mid-December and once the wether and soil has cooled down. We have planted bulbs a little later than this before and flowering has not been affected, try to plant before the ground gets too frosty! A general rule is to plant bulbs approx 2-3 times as deep as the size of the bulb. Larger bulbs should be planted a little deeper to help anchor them as they grow. Take care not to plant smaller bulbs too deep as they may run out of energy sending shoots up before their leaves can reach the sun. Planting bulbs at the correct depth can help to protect them from pests and frosts. If you have a heavy clay soil, many bulbs will benefit from adding some peat free/ free draining compost to the planting hole or incorporating some drainage material such as grit or horticultural sand. A mesh can be used to cover bulbs in pots to help deter squirrels. After planting cover the bulbs back over with the soil and firm in. As your bulbs start to grow in spring/summer some may benefit from watering in dryer spells, especially Alliums.
After flowering
After flowing it’s a good idea to leave the foliage to wither and die back naturally, this allows the bulb to continue to draw energy for the next year’s flowers. Spent flower stems can be cut back as the flowers die back but as mentioned above some seed heads, especially many of the alliums are attractive so leaving these in place makes sense too. Applying a good organic mulch in autumn will help to protect the bulbs over winter and feed the soil.
Tulips and Alliums look best when planted in groups, when planting in the ground we tend to plant Tulips of the same type in groups of 5 or 7, smaller Alliums could be in groups of 9. In pots you may want to plant many more than this to create an abundant bulb display.
Bulbs can be planted in the spaces between other perennials and grasses which may help to support them as they grow
Remember to sit back and enjoy your hard work on a sunny spring day!
Thank you GeeTee bulbs for use of some of your photos and for sharing discount code!
