Why be content with only two weeks of tulips when you can enjoy their wonderful flowers for two months?
It is all a matter of selecting the right types and varieties; even if you are a greenhorn gardener, your catalogs can help you do this if you give them a chance.
The trick is learning to use your bulb catalog as a guide, not merely as a picture book. Nine out of ten gardeners make out their orders for tulips by skimming through color plates in their catalogs and jotting down the names of the varieties that particularly appeal to them.
This procedure would be satisfactory if all types of tulips were illustrated in color, but they are not.
Many types are given little space, for the catalog maker’s job is to sell bulbs, and he gives most space to the kinds that sell in the largest quantity.
Different Types Of Tulips
To get the greatest display of tulips in your garden, you should have types sufficiently different from blooming over a long period.
This will mean using at least some varieties of the following types:
- Early-flowering (mid-March to mid-April): Species, Species Hybrids, Single Earlies, Double Earlies, Triumph, and Mendels.
- Late-flowering (mid-April to mid-May): Cottage, Darwin, Breeder, Late Doubles, or Peony-flowered.
Early Flowering Species And Hybrids
The species and hybrids are the earliest, many ahead of the daffodils. They are, for the most part, low growing.
Among varieties generally available are:
- Clusiana, white with pink stripes
- Kaufmanniana Caesar Franck, cream, exterior rose
- Scarlet Elegance, scarlet, multi-flowered
- Vivaldi, cream-yellow, exterior crimson
- Tulipa praestans ‘Fusilier’, red, multi-flowered
The best known of this type is Red Emperor (Mme. Lefeber). Comparatively, new huts are now among the most popular. This largest of tulips is scarlet with a black base.
Single Earlies
Single earlies play a minor role in the catalogs but a major one in the garden, for they give brilliant color and, in some cases, delicious fragrance at a period when it is much needed.
In addition, they grow 10” to 16” inches high, are long-lasting, and are excellent for cutting.
Some good varieties are the following:
- LaReve Rose
- Couleur Cardinal, orange-scarlet, fragrant
- Rising Sun, fragrant
- Fred Moore, General De Wet, Prince of Orange, all shades of orange and fragrant
- White Hawk and Pink Beauty, pink and white
Double Earlies
Double earlies are double forms of the preceding. They are of good substance, stand out well in exposed locations, and are even longer-lasting than the singles.
My favorites are the following:
- Merillo, white and pink
- Peach Blossom Rose
- Tea Rose, yellow, fragrant
- Scarlet Cardinal and Purity (Schoonard), white
Late-Flowering Types
Late-flowering types bring the round-up of the tulip season, consisting of three main groups: cottage, Darwins, and breeders.
Here are some of the finest are the following:
Cottage:
- Rosy Wings and Smiling Queen, pink
- Advance and G. W. Leak, red
- Yellow Emperor
- Orange King, fragrant
- Carrara, white
Darwin:
- Chas. Needham, scarlet
- Clara Butt, pink
- Golden Age, deep yellow
- Niphetos, lemon
- Faust, deep purple
- The Bishop, bluish-purple
- Insurpassable, lilac
- William Copeland, mauve, fragrant
- Helen Gahagan, cream
- White Giant
Breeders
- Indian Chief, copper-red
- President Hoover, orange
- Dixie Sunshine
- Tantalus, yellow
- Admiral Tromp, orange
- Don Pedro, mahogany, fragrant
- Prince of Orange, fragrant
Double or Peony-flowered
- Eros, pink
- Uncle Tom, purple-red
- Symphonia, red
- Mt. Tacoma, white
Parrot Lilies
The parrot lilies have deeply fascinating petals and usually green stripes or blotches. They are now available in a dozen or more different colors.
Among the best are:
- Fantasy, pink
- Early Wonder, red
- Gadean, violet
Lily-Flowered Tulips
The lily-flowered tulips have rather pointed, recurving petals and are particularly grateful for cutting.
Good ones are the following:
- Captain Fryatt, wine-red
- China Pink
- Mrs. Moon, deep yellow, fragrant
- Alaska, canary
- Maytime, mauve, edged white
- The Bride, white
44659 by F. F. Rockwell