Fall Bulbs - The Catalogs Are Arriving by the Hundredweight.

Daffodils are the national flower of Wales.
Mrs. Ichabod's boss loved seeing them on his desk.
We grew them in our lawn and mowed late.

A true bulb is actually a flower encased in food for the plant. Fall bulbs planted early will develop roots and send the stem upward, but break the surface only after a good winter and a spring thaw. Fall bulbs can  and should be planted early. When I got them late in New Ulm, Minnesota, I had to dig near the parsonage, where the soil was still soft from the heat in the basement.

Like roses, I have planted fall (akakhardy) bulbs almost everywhere we lived.

Someone was kind enough to plant Grape Hyacinths at our home in Springdale, the Ichabode. They bloom early, for a long time, flower and then go to seed, creating a patch of color here and there. They multiply, so they are a good choice for naturalizing.

Make a Big Bet on Bulbs
The only place to get fall and spring bulbs is Dutch Gardens. They are bigger and cost less than all others. That has been true for decades.

http://www.dutchgardens.com/

Sign up for their catalogs - works of art by themselves.

Like many gardening adventures, bulbs can inspire the hair-on-fire buy everything impulse. That will be coupled with remorse with all of them arrive at once. They have to be dug into the ground.

My suggestion is to make one big bet each year on favorite bulbs.

1. Buy a large amount of one variety, one color. The mass of color is impressive.
2. Or - buy two colors and group them accordingly.
3. Plan for a layer of little bulbs planted above the big ones.

Daffodils are an easy choice. Critters do not eat them, so they are not dug up and replanted by tree squirrels and ground squirrels - as crocus are.

The layer above could be early tiny bulbs.  That would mean one larger hold about seven inches deep, a fair amount of soil to move, the big bulbs covered up, then the tiny bulbs in the top layer.

We did group bulb orders at several churches and got a bulb discount, which we took in bulbs to plant at the church.

Grape Hyacinths are not hyacinths
and often come in other colors.

My Modest Plan
I am going to buy some Grape Hyacynths, which are very inexpensive, long lasting, and good at multiplying.

Our helper will get some to plant with his two children. They are enjoying gardening and participating:

• The maple tree seedling from our yard is now 10 feet tall in theirs.
• The Purple Splash roses are in bloom all the time.

Purple Splash blooms all the time if prune.
Our helper's son prunes and mulches it.

Bulbs Are the Perfect Flower - Unless Varmints Eat Them

The Gardening Combine is already after me to buy fall bulbs, also called hardy bulbs. They do not just tolerate the winter - they need cold weather to bloom in the spring.

Gardeners know that some are not true bulbs, since they do not have a complete flower inside. Tulips and daffodils do, but others are partial and get the name corm, etc.

Tulips are a true bulb, so the quality and size of the bulb indicate the beauty of the flower that emerges. The leaves then prepare next year's bulb, which is normally pretty good. Maximum sized bulbs come from not allowing the bloom for some time, building up the food supply.

Similarly, bargain bulbs are going to produce bargain blooms that will not easily repeat. They may come up again, but they will be even weaker than the weak first ones.

Hardy bulbs are a reward for planning and planting ahead. I have had daffodils and crocus coming up in my lawn, long before mowing was needed. I have enjoyed seeing big drifts of large one-color tulips coming up, last of all, after all the others have bloomed - like the finale at the July 4th fireworks display.

Although roses photograph well, tulips are best enjoyed face-to-face. I never cut them for inside, because they provide so much happiness for people walking by.

Once I received a bunch of free bulbs, which I planted next to the garage in Midland. Someone wanted a tour of my four gardens. We approached from the driveway, then walked to the right side of the garage. The principal's wife saw them all in bloom, touched my forearm, and began to cry. She was moved by the beauty. As Luther wrote, "Women are more easily moved to tears of sorrow or joy than men are."

Our neighbor wrote again (emailing from next door) - "Chris, let's meet at the rose garden." They had a great time talking as they looked over the roses and discussed what might come next. Sassy left the computer area, sitting in the living room to monitor the situation. Sassy was not used to voices on her porch, so she waited there until she was happy that everyone was safe and happy.

Last night she played with our helper's children in the backyard, who tossed her favorite ball and petted her while their dad mowed the front yard.

The Rubik's Cube graphic illustrates how every article of faith is part of the one doctrine which is the Christian Faith. The Lutheran Reformers avoided treating each article as a separate doctrine (to be argued, compromised, set aside, rejected) instead of viewing Christian doctrine as a unified whole.

Our poor human minds cannot comprehend the complete truth of the Bible at once, so we tend to highlight one thing, such as the divinity of Christ. But if one square (article of faith) is off, all the rest are out of order as well.

Nevertheless, we are not free to switch and swap dogmas and to make them trademarks of a franchise or brand. When people ask me to do this, I voice our opposition to the four-digit zip code extension, unless someone is incredibly rich. Then we do not excommunicate.

The sects  are like aphids, crawling out on one branch of the Christian faith, pretending their particular segment is the entire faith by itself. Like aphids, they suck the life out -  until all is dead or diseased. The CLC and WELS are famous for their canonical lawyers debating at which stage someone can say a prayer with Granny, who may be Lutheran, but not their Lutheran. Meanwhile they glory in their copy and pasting from false teachers - not just from Kelm and Jeske, but from really bad dudes like Groeschel and Rick Warren.

The tulip bulb is a whole flower, planted with most of the food it needs to break out of the damp soil and glorify the Creator with color. When we proclaim the Gospel Word, it should be the entire Gospel and not some legalistic sliver designed to mark everything else as a crime scene.