How to store tulip bulbs after digging, and why certain conditions are needed, it is worth knowing to each grower. Digging bulbs for the summer will help to preserve them, and to ensure abundant flowering in the next season. The tubers should be stored in a suitable environment, following the rules, otherwise it makes no sense to dig them out, it will only hurt.
How to store
Each tulip bulb knows how to store tulip bulbs at home until planting. In order to subsequently grow beautiful flowers, it is necessary to fulfill the extraction time (not earlier than July), the requirements for storage, sorting, processing before planting in open ground in the fall.
Tuber maintenance in winter
Important! In Holland, growing bulbs is tantamount to a cult; Amsterdam has its own tulip museum. The volume of flowers exported from the Netherlands is three quarters of all sold tulips on the planet. Dutch farmers offer to buy at a cheap price onions of the main distillation varieties wholesale or retail.
How to keep after digging before planting
The process of extraction and subsequent preservation is biologically necessary. Maternal ripe onion begins to die, preserving in the future young growth (children). Such a course of things is also resuming in the new season, respectively, the issues of growth and development are getting worse: there is not enough food and the amount of seats. Flowers begin to fade, thin out, lose their elegance.
Inbox process
Digging tubers for winter time is also necessary in order to prepare the soil:
- Add fertilizer, peat and sand to it,
- Increase its fertility
- Remove weed grass roots without damaging the flowers.
Note! If you remove the remains of scales from the bulbs after digging, the risk of infection of the flowers with caterpillars of pests and fungal diseases will be reduced. An annual treatment of planting material with a mixture of potassium permanganate or Fundazol will also be beneficial.
Digging also promotes the propagation of valuable cultivars. If you plant the bulb, do not remove it for the winter, then it will begin to go deeper into the ground, from where it will be more difficult for the sprout to break through.
Bulbs dug up
How to store correctly:
- At the time of extraction, the bulbs need careful care. If the upper protective layer is damaged, a fungal disease can occur.
- Store optimally in a wooden box. Cardboard is often damp and does not allow air to circulate well, so fungal or bacterial damage can occur.
- If desired, planting tubers are placed with wood shavings to eliminate excess moisture.
- Bulbs are laid in one layer.
- If there is a basement, onions, it makes sense to put it directly on a dry shelf, while it is necessary to control the temperature drops.
- Professionals store bulbs in special heat chambers, where the optimal temperature regime is maintained.
- In rare cases, the bulbs are stored in the lower section of the refrigerator, where the temperature is kept in the region of 3-5 degrees.
After all the tulips in the garden are cut, the bulbs ripen for about a month. The stems and leaves at this moment die, the bulbs begin to acquire a brown color. You can get them already at the moment when two or three green leaves turned yellow and wilted. As a rule, this period begins in the third decade of July.
Important! You can’t remove tubers before the deadline. In this case, they do not have time to mature and form, so the protective layer will not be strong, this will contribute to the development of fungal diseases. As a result, the bulbs will not be able to survive until planting. If they do, then flowering will not give good.
Bulb processing after digging
The process of processing after digging has an important function - to prevent rot of the bulbs and protect against bacteria, fungus. First, the onions are dried, then processed.
Processing process
Note! In some cases, it is allowed to rinse the tubers with cold running water immediately after digging. After either disinfect karbofos, or put in 50-degree water for 10 minutes. A processing option will also be a solution of potassium permanganate. In this case, the bulbs are sent after processing for drying, and then for storage.
If the tubers were not processed before drying, then after a week they should be treated with manganese sodium or contact fungicide.
How to dry onions
When the bulbs are removed, do not clean them from scales or from the ground. Tubers should be placed in baskets or well-ventilated containers, put in a dry, warm place for a period of about a week.
Places that are suitable:
- Veranda,
- Canopy
- Gazebo
- A shed with good ventilation.
Drying of planting material
Note! When the onions are sent for drying, they should not be exposed to direct sunlight.
After a week, the tubers are cleansed of integumentary plates and roots, rotten and damaged ones are removed, the rest are sorted by size. If minor damage is present, they can be cut off, removed with a sharpened knife, then washed. Then the planting material is worth processing.
Forcing tulips
Forcing tulips is a set of measures that contribute to the active growth of culture in an unusual season for it. In winter, tulips go through a period of rest. At this point, the organs of the future plant are laying inside the bulb.
If you act on the bulbs in certain ways, you can make the plant bloom even in winter. So, during the action of the required temperature during storage and subsequent distillation, the culture begins to bloom several months ahead of schedule. Thus, beautiful tulips are obtained for spring and international women's day on March 8, New Year and Christmas.
Hydroponic distillation
Additional Information. For distillation, certain varieties are selected. For February-March, many types of them are suitable, by May 1 or April, carefully choose the suitable ones.
Stages of distillation:
- Storage after digging,
- The rooting process - lower temperatures are needed,
- The moment of distillation itself is the cultivation of the culture in warm rooms until the onset of budding.
A plant is prepared for forcing already when it blooms in the open ground. They carefully look after it, take care that the bulbs accumulate the maximum amount of nutrients. Agrotechnical measures and mandatory decapitation (removal of the growth point) are carried out.
During storage, temperature conditions are important before distillation. The temperature can be changed, thereby pushing back or approximating the moment of flowering.
During storage processes, exposure occurs:
- High temperatures
- Low.
First, after the excavation phase, tubers are stored at temperatures of 20-23 degrees for a month. This is optimal for the formation of flower primordia. After, in August, the whole month the bulbs are in conditions of 20 degrees, in September - 16-17 degrees.
For the New Year, distillation is considered one of the most difficult, because by the time the bulb starts to cool, all parts of the future tulip should already be formed in it. To accelerate the laying of parts of the flower using agrotechnical and physico-chemical methods. At the first, tulips fall in film during the growing process, and decapitation is carried out, in the second - digging is carried out ahead of schedule, after the bulb is kept for about a week at a temperature of 34 degrees.
Growing tulips at home by March 8
For distillation, by March, varieties are suitable:
- Kiss Nelis,
- Oxford,
- Eric Hofsyu
- London,
- Vivex,
- Diplomat.
Bulbs must be of high quality, purchased from trusted sellers. The highest quality will be those that are brought from Holland, marked "Giant". As a rule, before selling them, they are pre-treated with special solutions that contribute to the favorable storage and good growth of the flower in the future. Harvesting can also be done from your tulips growing in the garden. However, remember that not all of them will be able to survive a period of rest and subsequently germinate.
Spring holiday distillation
In order to grow beautiful flowers by March 8, first prepare the soil, a container for planting and create favorable growing conditions.
The container must be with drainage holes - so the roots will not begin to rot if they are flooded excessively with moisture.
It is imperative to have a lamp that will illuminate young sprouts and contribute to their active growth and development, since the whole process will take place in the winter.
Important! It is impossible to cover the tank with film - seedlings will not go faster, on the contrary, the tubers in the boxes will begin to rot.
The soil should be loose, easily passing air and water. Such soil is purchased in a store, you can do it yourself:
- Land from the plot
- Humus,
- Sand river in equal proportions, mix thoroughly.
Gliocladin tablets are allowed to be added to the soil, which will prevent purulent root processes.
Before germination, the bulbs are kept in cold rooms or in the refrigerator to protect them very well until planting. An important point is that the temperature should be reduced progressively, from August to October from 20 to 16 degrees.
Before planting, the bulbs are prepared: they are completely peeled, each tuber is carefully examined, the presence of rot, parasites, and damage are detected. Only healthy specimens are planted. After inspection, the tubers are soaked in a solution of potassium permanganate, disinfected, then sorted by grade and size.
Note! If the earth is taken from the garden, it should be disinfected. To do this, it is placed in the oven, aged at elevated temperature. It can also be treated with potassium permanganate, it will kill various bacteria and pests in the soil.
The final stage is landing. With it, the tubers are slightly pressed into the ground. The space between the tubers is 1-2 cm. After the substrate is covered, so that the tips are visible at the top. It is very important that the bulbs are not close to one another.
After watering the soil. Capacity is sent to a cold place or refrigerator. To get a box is a month before when the culture should bloom.
What to do after distillation
Distillation is carried out in greenhouses or at home on a windowsill in suitable boxes. After the distillation process, planting tubers can be saved with the aim of subsequently planting in open ground.
- At the time of distillation, there is an active development and growth of culture. After the flower stalks have been removed or cut, it is worth giving time to the culture to complete the development cycle. For a month, tulips are watered and aged at 20 degrees.
- Then the bulbs are removed from the soil and dried. After one and a half months of keeping them in a cool room, the tubers can be planted again or wait until the onset of autumn and planting in open ground. It all depends on the tulip variety: if it is late blooming, then the shelf life must be extended.
With proper storage of tulip bulbs, you can subsequently enjoy their beauty and colorful flowering. Their buds begin to bloom before all crops and give a spring mood to summer residents. A variety of varieties allows you to make the garden plot original and spectacular.
