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Spring bulbs - additional benefits?

Edward Norton

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I’m still new to permaculture and my PDC has made me look at everything in new light. I was thinking about what bulbs I’ll plant this autumn. Apart from being pretty, what other benefits are there to planting bulbs? I could plant crocus and harvest saffron, but other than that, I’m stumped. Is pretty enough?

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Edward Norton

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Just thought of one - early pollen source for bees.

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K Kaba

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Early bee food. Hive pollinators have to get the baby factory going again after winter, and if the early solitary bees are supported, their population gets an earlier start.

My kitchen garden started being a lot more productive the first year my crocus and snowdrops and daffodils bloomed. After noticing that, I've encouraged the wild violets and other spring blooming weeds. By the time my spring veggies are flowering there's bees everywhere.

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Pretty can be enough after a long winter!
Some erythronium species have edible bulbs. They grow well for me, lovely reflexed flowers, but I haven`t bulked them up enough to try eating yet. I may dig some up and see how they are doing and spread them out this autumn.

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Anne Miller

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I like the idea that some may be edible or at least the flowers of some are edible.

Jerusalem Artichokes have a pretty flower that wildlife loves and an edible bulb.

Daylilies are pretty and functional since the flowers of some can be eaten.

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Heather Sharpe

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From what I have read, if you're planting spring bulbs such as daffodils for pollinators, it's best to steer clear of the more hybridized ones. The sort with double and triple petals or other "showy" qualities. In breeding for those characteristics, traits that are helpful to pollinators (like producing pollen, aroma, accessibility of the flowers for feeding, etc) are often lost. Species or heirloom types are probably better for them.

I've been planting daffodil bulbs around other plants I want to protect from having their roots munched by voles and such. Since daffodils are poisonous, my hope is that they'll dissuade the critters from going past them to my baby fruit trees and the like. Not sure if it works, but the results sure are pretty. I've used garlic for the same thing.

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elle sagenev

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Pretty is enough.

I did plant a bunch of daffodils to deter ground animals. They ate them.

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Stacy Witscher

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elle - that's weird because they are extremely poisonous to pretty much everything. I have had them pulled up and thrown around. The deer get pretty angry that I put inedible stuff in their garden, they do the same thing with my chive plants. All the wildlife seems pretty desperate this year. Last year they fled the area because of the fires.

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Skandi Rogers

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Most spring bulbs round here are poisonous, I guess they wouldn't survive otherwise! Lesser celandine isn't and it's loved by the bees, but it's also very invasive. Remember spring crocuses are not the ones you get saffron from.

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Timothy Norton

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posted 1 year ago

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The primary function of my tulips and daffodils is to create beauty in the landscape. I do see insects browse them which I can only imagine helps in the early spring.

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Thekla McDaniels

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posted 1 year ago

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Pretty is enough but there areother functions getting stacked:

Uplifting after a long cold winter. Spring brings a lot of work, the daffodils provide moral support.

And many are poisonous, which defers gophers.

Some are edible, like tulip bulbs.

Early bloomers can mark pathways.

And, my garden is pretty disorganized. I plant crocus to mark where later perennials will be sprouting, otherwise I forget and disturb them when I try to plant something else.

Thought I would mention that the saffron crocus is fall flowering.

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Mary Cook

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posted 1 year ago

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Yes, pretty is enough, but there's also the pollinator food thing, and the fact that narcissi are poisonous is useful for protecting others things, I usually use it to protect other bulbs--tulips and lilies, which otherwise mice and chipmunks eat--but likely they can also protect fruit trees from voles and such. Most rodents also don't like alliums--I don't care for them as flowers, but onions and garlic could be planted in other places than the onions and garlic beds in your garden. And yes, they could be used as spring markers, but the spring blooming ones die down in summer and disappear, so then you need something to mark THEM...

Ray Schmidt

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posted 1 year ago

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Mary:
Do you know of real world success with this “ they can also protect fruit trees from voles and such”?
I have lost no less than six apple trees to voles

.
The last one I planted I put chicken wire down about 2 feet in the ground around the root ball
(all Internet sources I found said those don’t go any deeper than 2 feet). That bought me an extra year before they killed that tree.
Did some trenching this year for waterline project and found tunnels a measured 3 foot below grade so I guess the Internet hasn’t checked with my voles…

Thekla McDaniels

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Ray, so sorry about all those trees you have lost! What size chicken wire did you use?

I’m thinking the voles and gophers i know of, plus the mice and moles could easily pass through the standard chicken wire I know of. ~1 inch hexagons easy! Even the half inch hexagons might not be a barrier!

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Mary Cook

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But the poster says they found tunnels three feet deep, so it's not that the varmints went through the fence. Lordie! Three feet down! I have not actually done this myself, and have lost no fruit trees to voles (just lost most of the fruit to squirrels) We have had cats at times, and are surrounded by woods, so maybe the hawks and owls and foxes keep the rodents in check--and they were all distracted too mu ch by my chickens so we resorted to building a big fenced run for the chickens, which solved that problem--and the run includes the orchard, perhaps the chickens also keep rodents in check.

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