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31 Years of Tulip Bloom

On Thu, 23 Oct 1997, lowery@teamzeon.com wrote:

>   And hey, does anyone out there know how to make
> tulips behave like the perennial they are supposed to be???  Mine never
> bloom a second year!
> 
I have a border about 30 feet long, entirely in shade, here in 
Beltsville, Maryland, in which about a dozen clumps of tulips have 
bloomed vigorously every year since I planted them in 1966.  The complete 
border is about 90 feet long, but about 60 feet of it was in full sun in 
1966 and the tulips in that part of it bloomed for one or two seasons only.
I haven't seen them since.

What is the secret of the ones that have survived and bloomed all these 
years?

I have told a lot of garden visitors about these shade-grown tulips, and 
have never found anyone who has said, "Well, that's the way tulips are 
supposed to be grown!"  My own theory is that it is the hot 
Washington-area summer sun that has something to do with it.  The 31-year 
tulips don't get ANY *hot* sunshine.  They are planted under a very large 
tulip poplar, which is, of course, leafless during the winter and during 
much of the spring.  So they DO get lots of winter and spring sunshine.  The 
tulip leaves, which appear, as I recall, in early December most years, are 
able to make lots of food for the underlying bulbs during 
the entire winter and in much of the spring.  By the time the soil heats 
up elsewhere in the garden, the ground in which my tulips bulbs are
sleeping remains cool under the shade of the tulip poplar.  Do tulip 
bulbs dislike very warm soil conditions during their dormant period?

Am I certain this is why these tulips are so long-lasting and 
long-blooming?  Not at all.  But my explanation is as logical as any that 
I have heard.

Perhaps a more logical theory would be this one: 

Of course Harry's tulips have thrived where they are.  After all, didn't 
he plant them under a *tulip* poplar?

Well, and I hate to explode that theory, actually I didn't.  I lied.  The 
big tree they are under is really a sweet gum (Liquidambar).  I often wish 
I'd tried them under a tulip poplar (liriodendron; I have six big ones).

The far eastern end of the bed in which the tulips thrive is also shaded 
by a parrotia, which I planted at the edge of the sweet gum's 
circumference (also in 1966).  It is now about fifteen or so 
feet tall, but the tulips under it would still be shaded most of the day 
by the sweet gum, which is just west of the parrotia.

Some visitors tell me the summer shade has nothing to do with it.  
But what do they know?  Invariably they admit they don't have any tulips 
that have been functioning flawlessly for 31 years.

Harry

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