Gardening Articles

The term bulbous refers to plants that include true bulbs but also plants that grow from tubers, corms and rhizomes. These are the storage organs that enable bulbous plants to cope with difficult growing conditions and long periods of dormancy, during which time there is often nothing or little of the plant visible above ground.

Because many bulbous plants tend to be adapted to tough environments, this makes them invaluable in a garden setting. Many are suitable for the kind of thin, dry and nutrient deficient soil found at the foot of a hot and sunny wall. Others can cope with dry shade and are therefore ideal for planting under deciduous or evergreen trees, where nutrients and soil moisture are at a premium.

Spring-flowering, summer-flowering and autumn-flowering bulbs provide the opportunity to add an extra layer of color to your garden. Plant them under shrubs or between perennials in the flower border or use them to naturalized informally in lawns and orchards, or formally in seasonal bedding display. For splashes of color all around your garden you can also plant the bulbs in the pots.

Bulbous plants ring the seasonal changes throughout the year with glorious flower display. Some possess handsome foliage, others are valued for their flagrance, but above all, their blooms are the most essential. They offer a wide variety of color and form, from bright, primary shades to delicate, pastel hues.

Bulbs
True bulbs are formed from fleshy leaves or leaf bases and most of them consist of concentric rings of scales attached to a basal plate. The outer scales often form a dry, protective skin or tunic and the most known bulbous plants that have this protective skin on their bulb are: Daffodils, Reticulata Irises and Tulips. To other species like some Lilies or Fritillaria the scales are separate and no tunic is formed.

Corms
Corms are formed from a swollen bases of stems and are replaced by new corms every year. A corm consists of one or more internodes with at least one growing point. Corms are common to plants like: Crocuses, Gladioli, Romulea and Watsonia whom belong to the Iridiaceae family and usually have a tunic formed from the previous year’s leaf bases, or to genera like Brodiaea and Colchicum form the Liliaceae family.

Tubers
Tuberous is a term applied to many plants with swollen, often irregularly shaped stems or roots used for storage. The term is often misapplied. True tubers of various kind belong to plants like: Dahlia, Corydalis and some orchids.

Rhizomes
Rhizomes are swollen, usually more or less horizontal, underground stems that are found in the Iridiaceae, specially in Irises and in Liliaceae families.