Monday, February 7, 2011

Tulip Yang Merajuk...

Spring has always been the much awaited season after the cold, grey and barrenness of winter. It is my and everybody's favourite time of the year. Suddenly you start seeing bright, wonderful colours everywhere, beginning with the crocus, white, purple, lilac and yellow appearing in between the green grass on the fields. Then you see other spring flowers, daffodils, amaryllis, cherry blossom, hyacinth, tulips and many others. Every house in our neighbourhood would have something or some kind of these beautiful and colourful flowers, except us....

It was spring of 2009, DS and me technically had arrived here in December 2008 whereas DH arrived a few months earlier. Even though our landlord did plant a few plants like roses, lavender and a few others in our little garden, but it didn't have these wonderful spring flowers. Roses start to flower a little late in early summer and so does lavender I think. Seeing other houses looking so nice with the flowers, DH went out and bought some tulip bulbs. Now, I did not know much about tulips or how and when to plant them. But I was sure you did not plant the bulbs in spring !!! I told DH that, in fact I said maybe we should check on the internet first. But DH being a person who has his own mind to the extend that I sometimes call him very obstinate, decided to proceed. In fact he said "Well if I plant them now, they would flower in summer". So off they went... DH and DS both buzy pottering and burying those bulbs in the garden and the bit of land in front of the house. Once in a blue moon I would coax the bulbs by watering them, hoping against all odds that they would show their tiny buds soon, even though I did not really believe that they would. Summer came and went, still no signs of any lives and it didn't look like it's going to be any, snails in the garden were abundant and I'm sure the bulbs became their supply of food for the coming winter. November came, and for some reasons we did not plant any more bulbs. I have by now checked the best time to plant the bulbs :D Humphhhh.... talk about two ignorant people !!!

Then... it was spring again, I thought we would never see the day. It had been a cold winter, snow kept falling through out January and also February. Again... our house would be the only one without spring flowers. So imagine my surprise when one day, I found these little buds peeping from the soil from the little bit of land at the front house !!! My tulips !!! you came out after all !!! I couldn't believe it.... after one year the bulbs still sprouted leaves. Of course they were not many, only a handful of them, the rest had been eaten by snails I guessed :D


Taken on 17 March 2010

I wondered whether they would all flower. A Dutch neighbour told me that the male ones will not flower. So... tulips also have males and females ?? I didn't know that.... Maybe I should check on the internet...


Taken on 24 April

There were only 4/5 flowers, but it's enough to make me amazed.... I was sure they were "merajuk" and would not come out in the first place. I read somewhere that after flowering, the bulbs had to be taken out and kept in a dry place before being replanted in the next autumn. These bulbs of ours had gone through spring, summer and winter and only sprouting a year later !!!


Taken on 27 April. The white flowers had fully bloomed.


Moral of the story is always check beforehand :D and never ever give up....

13 comments:

TK said...

What a lovely tulip. I have always love tulip and planting flowering plants. These days I have been so busy and I have been ignoring my flowering plants. Satu pokok bunga dah terbunuh because I have no one to water the plant while I am not around. Sayang pokok tu.

Cheqna said...

Congrats! Lovely tulip..so what happened to the plant by now?...dont know much the stages but I love the flowers.

mmm..kesian pokok TK yang terbunuh tu :)

Am not good in planting, my cactus pun boleh mati..hehehehe

:-)

i amsterdam said...

TK, I love certain flowers and green plants too, but sadly to say they never survive with me he..he.. the only ones still in good condition right now is the cactus, the rest are wilting away even the banana plants. Yes you read right... i have banana 2 plants in the house right now. Maybe i should take a picture of it!!!

I guess I'm slightly better than Cheqna... becoz my cactus still survive and hers died ha..ha..ha..

i amsterdam said...

Cheqna..

That pink tulips? We left it when we moved here. I don't think it will flower again... it seems that you have to cut the leaves and wash the bulbs and keep it dry... then replant it again in autumn. Otherwise it will not flower, or if it did.. it is not a good quality one.

The exciting thing is, yesterday i realise that the bulbs that we planted in front of the kitchen has begun sprouting!!! I only see a few.. but hope more will come out soon!! If all are ok... hopefully come spring there will be a kaleidoscope of colours to feast the eyes. Let's pray they will be ok... he..he..

Aishah said...

Tulips are beautiful and strong. I wonder why they are not grown as well in other parts of the world. I had bought the packet bulbs and tried to grow them in Malaysia. Need I mention the outcome?;)

Your picture of the tulip against the white flowers is truly pretty.

i amsterdam said...

Hi Aishah,

Tulips are flowers of cold climate. The amazing thing is they did not even originate in Holland, but in Central Asia, on the western of Himalaya. Tulips in Holland were first brought(some say stolen) from Turkey. This deserves a special entry which insyaAllah I will try to write..

But the Dutch were very hardworking and they did a lot of research(still do) and manage to produce many varieties of tulips and they are the biggest exporter(if not the only one) of tulips in the world that people(including me) think tulips originate frm here.

Yes Aishah, you can grow the tulips in our country. My boss had done it before. In order to sprout, the bulbs need to be chilled first. You have to deceive them into thinking that they had gone through winter and now it's spring, so to speak. What my boss did was, she put them in the fridge for a few weeks.. before planting the bulb :D

Nana said...

Nice tulip! Good job!
Every time I pass by flower shops, I would check the flowers around and imagine how nice my garden would look like. Unfortunately, I don't have the green fingers. Sadly, they usually die. Looking forward to your new batch of spring flowers!

i amsterdam said...

Nana..

I too like to browse and look at the flowers in the shop!! I normally do it at supermarket.. where there is no owner lurking around what u want to buy hehe.. (i gave up buying coz they always die too...)

This new batch of tulips,I hope it really works!!! It is sunny and warm today that I went out & cut all the dead branches of some flower bushes and I spent time covering all the bulbs which had been upturned by the snow earlier. Today, more sprouts have come out!! I'm very excited :D

Cat-from-Sydney said...

Mother of Ilham,
Good luck in the gardening! Mama prefers planting veges and herbs, esp those she uses in her cooking. With the occasional roses. Flowers? She'll just grab some from the florists. Terrible, eh? purrr.....meow!

i amsterdam said...

Dear Angelina,

I notice that your mama sure have green fingers, her bird chillies and a few more herbs looked flourish and healthy... I tried to plant daun kesum but it was wilting away.. I threw them out. My regret was pokok pandan. It had grown and actually looked very nice in the pot of water... but then I was too bz with other things I did not transfer it to a proper pot with soil... and it died too :(

Since then, I haven't found daun pandan with roots yet...otherwise I will try again...

Komichan said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Komichan said...

When I returned to Japan I bought many Tulip bulbs as souvenir for my family, friends and myself. I didn't know about planting ,either so I learned through some internet sites like you. We have things in common, right? I planted the bulbs in November so in this spring I hope I can see beautiful Tulips in my small garden. I promise you will see some photos in my blog.

i amsterdam said...

Hi Komichan,

My ex-boss also asked me to bring back tulip bulbs for her!! But the tulips will have better survival rates in Japan compared to M'sia...

Come spring we shall see our garden pictures in the blogs... hopefully if mine ok that is hihihi