I haven’t done it with the amaryllis before, but with lots of other bulbs. I’ll buy tulips, hyacinth and narcissi on clearance at the end of the summer, stick the nets of bulbs in a brown paper bag with lots of holes, and put them in the back of the fridge until I remember them again around December. You can put the bulbs in dirt. or set them on top of a tray of aquarium gravel or pebbles, or use old-fashioned bulb vases. Anything the bulbs can stand up in and sit just above the water. Put water in until just under the bulbs, so they aren’t getting their bums wet. The roots will find the water.
It’s a great project to do at home with kids. I sacrificed a few bulbs that didn’t do well, and sliced them open. We also opened onions and garlic so the girls could see how they’re similar. It could be fun to force onions or garlic the same way, too. I haven’t done that yet.
If she or you would like to try a Brunsvigia bulb I could send you one. They are bigger than the ladies but with smaller fliowers interestingly arrayed. Here are my unclothed ladies in the front garden, taken this morning o.
I think this last one is a cross of some of the others.
Okay looks like we’re ready to start now. Local fauna include ravens.
That sky! Also I think the leaf on the buckwheat (?) is stunning too. I wonder if the snails can make use of the toxin in the leaf as some butterfly larvae do?
Perhaps. But it seemed more like it was sucking up water for the leaf and not eating it. Most, if not all, crawling things seem to get a lot of water from plants. Especially along drip lines.
It rained a bit before I got there. Storm clouds was coming over all day. The leaves were covered in water. But leaves also will transpire and pull up water from the ground and develop a slight drop to control force at the tips and edges. So sometimes a droplet will be there and insects will definitely drink it.
The spider has some beautiful longlegs that has some nice pink opaque look to them with its yellowish tan “knees” and the lovely black dots. One of the prettiest spiders to me. Truly a crawling flower. It’s the Green Lynx spider.
On my home front I finally got my first flowers on the largest of the Brunsvigias, B. josephinae.
Today was day one so who knows long term but for now the flowers on the hybrid between this one and B. litoralis has longer spokes at the ends of which each flower forms. Its stalk is also much more robust than the straight B. litoralis species, though no where near as large as B. josephinae.
Romulus was really good. I was not sure if someone was going to get the horror movie references or not lol.
That flower is really gorgeous. Kind of reminds me of some of the wild onions or wetland lilies where I live. Saw that it mentions those can take up to 12 years to bloom.
I took a 10 mile bike ride on our local Rails-to-Trails path in mid Michigan. Some of you will laugh. This was a huge accomplishment for me. On the way back I felt I’d earned a few stops for pictures.
It seems like some clematis has gone feral. I have never been this way before, so I missed it blooming. It was everywhere in this spot, so it must have been quite an impressive view earlier in the summer. I’ll be back!
