All Time Favorite Bulbs are For Growing in Pots and Boxes

Agapanthus or Blue Lily of the Nile

Fleshy-rooted evergreen plant, with strap leaves, often grown in tubs and urns on terraces and steps during the summer, when the tall blue spikes unfold. Culture is easy, but plants require a well-lighted, frost proof room or greenhouse in winter.

This is an old-time favorite, often seen in gardens of Europe.
Calla Lily. Showy, hardy outdoors in warmer regions, but a tender pot plant in the North. Most familiar is the white one with large, shiny, heart-shaped leaves. Start bulbs indoors in February or March in rich soil and, when weather settles, transfer to large pots and take outdoors. Calla lilies do well in full sun or part shade, are heavy feeders and need much water. There is also a dainty yellow with white-spotted leaves. Rest bulbs after foliage ripens and grow again.

Dahlias. Colorful and free-flowering, they provide bounteous cut blooms. Tall, large-flowering kinds can be grown only in large planters and boxes, but the dwarfs, even freer flowering, are excellent in small containers.

Attaining one to two feet tall, they grow easily from tubers in average soil in sun or part shade. They may also be raised from seed sown indoors in February. If tubers are stored in peat or sand in a cool, frost proof place, they can be grown for years. Check bulbs during winter, and if shriveling, sprinkle lightly.

Gladiolus

Summer-flowering with spear like leaves and many hued spikes. Corms can be planted in containers outdoors after danger of frost is passed. Set them six inches apart and four to six inches deep. If several containers are planted every two to three weeks, there will be a succession of bloom.

Stake stems before flowers open. After the leaves turn brown, or there is a frost, lift corms, cut off foliage and dust with DDT to control thrips. Store corms in a dry place at 45 to 55 degrees F. Gloxinias. Summer-flowering and tender with large, tubular blooms of red, pink, lavender, purple, or white, and broad velvety rosettes of leaves. Start tubers indoors and don’t take outside until weather is warm. Since the leaves are easily broken or injured by wind or rain, put plants in a sheltered spot. The low broad eaves of contem?porary houses, with restricted sun, offer an appropriate setting for rows of pots or window boxes filled with gay gloxinias.

Lilies

Gorgeous and hardy, with blooms in many colors. It is now possible to have a lily container garden, with flowers from May to frost. Open the season with the dainty Lilium pumilum and continue with madonnas, Golden Chalice hybrids, Olympic hybrids, auratums, and specios-ums. Lilies can be planted in fall, like daffodils and tu?lips, and they will also flower from bulbs set out in early spring. In cold regions, the rules for Dutch bulbs outdoors in winter apply also to lilies, which do well in large plant?ers, two feet wide and two feet deep. Group several of one variety for a good effect. Plant smaller sizes in individual six or eight inch pots to be wintered in cold frames. Plant larger sizes in eight or ten inch pots. After flowering put containers out of sight while stalks ripen.
Nurserymen and florists offer pot-grown lilies in early spring ready to plant in containers without disturbance of roots. Try combining several in large containers, with English ivy, vinca, grape ivy, dwarf annuals, or other low plants for softening effects. After flowering, bulbs can be planted in the garden, grown again in containers or given to friends.

Tuberose

Tender and summer-flowering with narrow foliage and tall spikes of single or double white flowers, fragrant and long-lasting. Where seasons are short, bulbs are best started indoors six to eight weeks before planting outdoors. Plant in six-inch pots and feed with liquid fertilizer. Tuberoses need a rich, well-drained soil and full sun and staking of the tall spike. Since bulbs do not flower well a second year start with fresh stock each spring.

Scented Leaved Geraniums

Scented leaved geraniums comprise a varied group that is treasured for the scent of the crushed leaves.

The flowers, smaller and less showy than those of zonal, are not so important. Familiar kinds include the nutmeg, with round leaves and small white flowers; the peppermint, with large, hairy, velvety leaves; the pine-scented, with big finely-cut leaves; the rose, with deeply-cut, toothed leaves; and the lemon-scented, with small leaves on compact plants.

A variety of the lemon-scented, Prince Rupert, is admired for its variegated green-and-white leaves. Scented-leaved geraniums prefer a light, well-drained loam. They make unique pot plants, and for a black iron kettle nothing is more decorative than a great sprawling peppermint geranium.

Ivy-leaved and Lady Washington Types

The trailing, ivy-leaved geraniums are among the most profuse flowering when grown under favorable conditions. They dislike shade and high humidity and thrive best in climates with warm days and cool nights, as in California. In window boxes, they offer a pleasant change from English ivy and vinca and present masses of lively color in hanging baskets suspended on porches, posts, lath houses, garages, or trees. Adaptable basket varieties include the lilac-white to pink Alliance, the double pint Galilee, and the lavender Santa Paula.

Lady Washington’s, considered the handsomest of geraniums, are not so easy to grow. Like the ivy-leaved, the) prefer cool nights and warm, sunny days, responding to shelter from wind and all-day sun. You may want a few for variety’s sake, like the lovely Easter Greeting, Lucy Becker, Gay Nineties, and Marie Rober. Lady Washington geraniums are sold by florists at Easter time, and gift plants you receive can be included in the container garden.

Cactus and Climbing

If you are a geranium enthusiast, you may want to spark your pot plant collection with some cactus and climbing geraniums. They have bizarre and fascinating forms and flowers and are certain to arouse comment. There is the parsley-leaved Otidia, the heart-leaved, knotted and rue-scented stork-bills, the prickly-stalked geranium, and the climbing square-stalked Jenkinsonia. Perhaps they are more interesting than handsome.

Sunshine Required

Geraniums are sun-loving plants. They will grow in window boxes and pots on the east, south, or west side of the house and on terraces with sun for half a day. In spite of their love of sunshine, they will even flourish with just a little, provided they receive plenty of strong light.

The north side of a house, beyond the shade of trees, will produce extraordinary plants. When geraniums are grown against hot, sunny brick, concrete, or stone walls or pavements, some shielding from the torrid noonday sun is advisable. This is to cut down on reflected heat through the middle part of the day.

Soil and Potting

Geraniums flourish and look well in pots, boxes, and planters. They thrive in various soil mixtures if drainage is good. For abundant bloom, however, supply a special preparation, not high in nitrogen, or lush foliage and few blooms will result.

A combination of three parts good garden loam and one part leaf mold, peat moss, or compost plus a five-inch pot of bone meal to each bushel is good. If the garden loam is heavy, add sand. Acid soil will also need some lime. I have success with good garden soil and a sprinkling of a 5-10-5 fertilizer and bone meal. During the growing season, plants respond to a low-nitrogen fertilizer in liquid form.

When potting, be generous with drainage material to insure free passage of water. Always water with care, since too much or not enough can be harmful. The best rule is to water when the surface of the soil feels dry. Then soak the soil well and do not water again until plants need it. If soil is kept too wet, leaves will turn yellow; if too dry they wilt and discolor. Both extremes cause legginess, a common complaint from gardeners.

Keep up Appearance

To maintain even plant growth, turn containers frorr time to time. Remove yellow leaves and faded blossoms which are especially distracting on plants at doorways and other key spots. If rain rots and disfigures the centei florets of the heads, pull them off with your fingers, leaving the unmarred outer florets and buds. This is admittedly an exacting chore for the busy gardener, but one that greatly improves the appearance of plants.

On the whole, geraniums are pest free, but if insects prove troublesome, malathion or lindane will clean them up. To your delight, you may even discover dead Japanese beetles on the foliage, since flower and leaf parts contain a substance that is poisonous to this pest.