Dreams Do Come True Reading Spring is too beautiful to stop celebrating her in Autumn 5 minutes Next The Biggest Amaryllis Collection Ever!

Spring is too beautiful to stop celebrating her in Autumn

I can’t help myself during the Autumn months: I’m still (or already, depending on how you look at it) thinking of Spring. Not all the time, sometimes I see a lot of Dahlias as well, and I also really enjoy putting together that assortment. I’ve already come across many new ones that I would love to add to the website for next year. But the Daffodils are never too far away: if Mother Nature would please, please stop giving us rain for a few days I could plant the Fluwel Specialty Narcissus again. I’m already busy planting all the new varieties in my little greenhouse. There are a lot of them this year, I would estimate around 600 pots. Believe it or not, but it’s 600 because I would like to slightly reduce the amount of varieties in my possession. Now that all the new seedlings are coming into the picture, I have around 1500 different kinds of Daffodils, and I try to tell myself that keeping that number around 1000 would be preferable.

But how to throw varieties out? I am always reminded of a scene from a Dutch comedian: ‘Making a sculpture is easy. Sculpting an elephant, for example: just get a large piece of stone and take away everything that doesn’t look like an elephant.’ Easy enough, right? Just throw out everything that doesn’t look like your favourite Daffodil. Hmm… The Daffodils have also been on a streak of bad luck. Over the past couple of years, the weather hasn’t been the best. Every time they were looking truly good, a big storm came along, or some heavy rainfall or hail. The North Sea Coast can be merciless, and then you can’t really see the elephant in the stone.  But now that we’re in the greenhouse anyway, I might as well show you some of the Lilies. You could already see her in the photo of me and the pots of Daffodils: Lily Batavia. I planted her to do a little experiment with Scarlet Lily Beetles. Most gardeners know about this pesky insect, and I had been given a biological substance to combat the Lily Beetles, and I wanted to see if it worked before I start telling everyone about it. I had sprayed it on half of the Lilies in the greenhouse, and what do you know: No beetles! Even the Lilies next to it that had not been treated didn’t have the Scarlet Lily Beetles. It might be that it works that well, but I don’t want to risk it and will repeat this experiment next year to see if it was truly this new stuff or if we just coincidentally did not have the insects this time around.  Bella Blush in the Poldertuin in Anna Paulowna 

Back to the spring blooming flower bulbs, because if you haven’t ordered those yet, it’s time to really start thinking about it. I don’t want to push you here, but I want to be honest, and it would be smart to not wait too long this year. I’ve told you about it before, but the harvest wasn’t great this year, and that means that we have less stock than we usually do. If there is anything you want to try this year, I really do urge you to order them before they’re sold out. Obviously, we will ship spring-blooming bulbs  in November as well, but I see many good varieties go out of stock every day.  Jamin at Grower Heemskerk in Lisse

I will point out a few varieties that are still in stock that are, in my opinion, very good choices this year. If you’re looking for pink, Tulips Bella Blush and Jamin are two of our very best rookie varieties. They are large and no-nonsense, real eye-catchers that are sturdy garden varieties that bloom well in any garden. If the weather isn’t the best, they will still give you a good show. Dinnerplate

Then on to the Daffodils. If you want to go big this year, I would strongly consider Dinnerplate. You can see her in the Bella Blush picture in the background: a bright, happy colour and an oversized bloom. She got her name because of the size of that bloom, too.  Little Alfred

Then, to close things off, one of my favourite Daffodils: Little Alfred. I know they won’t be the most popular variety, for some reason yellow seems to be a little bit out of style at the moment. I’ll never understand why, I think Daffodil yellow is one of the happiest colours in the world and I enjoy it every year, it never gets old. Little Alfred is a smaller Daffodil, a bit like February Gold, but much more graceful. A solid and happy choice… Add to basket, I would say!

Time to wrap this up again. To give you one more bit of practical information: The first orders have been shipped! The ones that were ordered first are sent out first, so don’t worry if your package has not arrived yet. But don’t be afraid: You will receive your flower bulbs soon, and then it’s truly time to party! 

Kind regards,

Carlos van der Veek