The busiest part of the shipping season is over. Orders have ground to a halt, and I can turn my attention to more pressing needs, getting the greenhouses ready for winter. This is still a very busy time of year, since all the bulbs that are in storage must be replanted, and seeds of the winter-growing species are sown this time of year. My two young helpers just finished repotting the Lachenalias, and I will spend time sowing seeds today. I posted on seed sowing before, and this posting can be found when you scroll down 'Categories'.
I have been working on my warm greenhouse, doing mostly housekeeping chores, and it is a pleasure to walk in there now, with all the dead leaves removed from the plants, the pots all weeded, rows organized and floors swept. This greenhouse holds most of the South American species, including the members of the Family Amaryllidaceae. There are some South American bulbs, like Leucocoryne, that grow on a Mediterranean cycle, and these are grown along with the South African species in my Mediterranean greenhouse. When I say it is a warm greenhouse, it is not actually heated at all. I have a large bench with heating mats for the species that need warm night-time temperatures, since our nights here are cold even in summer, but the rest of the greenhouse has to handle our temperatures here, and they seem to do fine. I have this greenhouse tightly closed up in winter, which will keep it at least ten degrees F. above the ambient temperature at night, and on sunny days it can still get quite warm. We do get frost here, but usually no more than a couple of degrees, and the low temperature at night will only last for an hour or two.
The South African members of the Family Amaryllidacea (like Boophone, Brunsvigia, Cyrtanthus, etc.) are also in this greenhouse. During the busy shipping season things can get rather chaotic in this greenhouse, since none of these bulbs are stored dry for shipping, but are freshly unpotted, roots washed and packed in damp material, and shipped intact. Removing roots from a bulb that keeps permanent roots year round, like the Amaryllids, will set it back severely, so if the roots are kept intact and not allowed to dry out, and the bulb planted right away, it will hardly know anything has happened to it. This is incredibly labor-intensive. I have some bulbs in individual pots, but others are planted together, since they need depth to develop properly, and that means tipping a pot out, selecting a good bulb, and putting the others back. I once packed a large order of all Amaryllid species which took the better part of two days to extract, clean and pack. The recipient (in Denmark) planted them as soon as she received them, and they did well. Many nursery owners would think this is insanely inefficient, but I simply don't know how to do it any other way if I want to grow a bulb properly, and send it bare root. I have some of the small seedling bulbs in small pots called bands, but they will not increase in size once put into these pots, so their use is limited.
My helpers and I are also working on the Mediterranean greenhouse, repotting Gladiolus, Lachenalia and Moraea. We have finished the Oxalis section, and the native bulbs, such as Calochortus, are yet to be done. In despair this summer I said I was discontinuing native bulbs, but this was in reaction to my losing all my lilies, most Erythroniums and nearly all my Fritillarias due to our cold, wet spring. I have reconsidered, especially since I was able to get some lily seed this summer, so I am not giving up yet.
