New Orleans - premature bulb bloom?

[pm]

Hello folks,

I just noticed that 3 of my Darwin Hybrid Tulips are about to bloom, and rest of the bunch also look like will be blooming soon. Is it too early for New Orleans south shore near the lake? I am almost to the point of giving up that I must have done something wrong that the bulbs are coming up too early and will not really bloom. BTW, these were from Brent and Becky's. Dimensionwise, I would say they are about 6"-8" tall, and the flower spike is just as tall as the opening leaves, almost hidden within the large leaves.

Something similar with my Sam's Club purchase daffodils as well. Almost similar heightwise as the tulips, and a bunch of them have flower stalks already out. In fact, the most eager one's flower head is already kind of drooping, may be because the stalk has not matured yet fully and the flower is too heavy for it? I am talking in entirely unscientific terms, so please forgive my ignorance.

Any idea what's going on? Am I rightly alarmed or is this normal? I put the bulbs in refrigerator beginning of 10/03, and planted them in the ground beginning of 12/03. Of course that we are going to get near freezing temps is worrying me too.

Thanks.

Priyo.

[paghat]

Spring starts sooner for the Gulf states than indicated by the "average" expected bloom season estimates for the whole USA. Some hybrid tulips bloom this early even further north, though for so early as January I'd expect Triumphs well before Darwins. It has nothing to do with you doing something wrong though; they do what they want when they want to depending on how they experience the seasons. But they may not be getting ready to bloom quite as early as you think; they can be producing leaves then buds quite a long while before actually ready to burst into full flower.

Some daffodils just naturally have very floppy flower stems. Usually they produce enough grassy leaves to brace the stems which keeps them from actually looking tipped over. But really, there's no reason they should be totally upright like chopsticks stuck in the ground in order to look great.

I wouldn't worry. Even if there was cause to worry, nothin' you could do about it, so just give it a shrug & observe what happens in the next few weeks. As for freezing, if all you get is morning frosts, that's not going to be enough to hurt early bulbs.

-paghat the ratgirl

[animaux]

It's not something you did wrong. The south has had an abnormally warm winter. Most days have been in the high 60s through 70s, with days like two days ago in the 80 degree range. What we get in Austin, you get a few days later...for the most part.

There is nothing you can do about tulips blooming too early. For this reason, I don't plant tulips unless I'm fully ready to lose them to a hard frost after they emerge during our very warm days and nights in winter.

I do use many different daffodils.

You can cover them if a hard freeze is on the way. Do not use plastic. Use a sheet and you can cover the sheet with plastic, but don't cover the foliage with plastic directly. Make sure you remove the cover during the day or the overheating can cook the foliage.

That's about all you can do.

[pm]

Hello Paghat and Animaux,

Thanks for the mails. Well, yeah, I am taking a look at the plants every morning and evening, because that is all I can do. Fortunately last night's and tonight's cold snap are not supposed to b freezing, but thanks for the tips on covering up in case of inclement weather.

Thanks again fellows. Great newsgroup.

Nice work with the web site, Paghat!!

[marie]

I agree with this person.

[C]

Welcome to the reality of global warming. The climates are changing. It's a cyclic thing exasperated by this land's poor enviornmental policies.

Wait in anticipation and then enjoy. Plants have been around much longer than us and they have a better feel for what's going on than we.

[animaux]

Global warming is a definite problem, but it has nothing to do with the unpredictable weather in the deep south, during winter. It can be 80 today, 35 tomorrow.

Global warming is effecting the polar ice caps. It doesn't show up in ordinary conditions at levels which would cause alarm for anyone. However, it's insidious and effects places where nothing lives. It's evident there, but has nothing to do with the winter weather in the south.

We all know growing bulbs which require cooling periods could possibly not perform well. Some people insist on planting them, I do not. Daffodils I do have planted, but they are far better for southern climates than are tulips.

Victoria

[Brian Quincy Hutchings]

overall of "global" warming is a crock (Svente Ahrennius' 1896 metaphor, taht cannot even account for the differentials that are in an ordinary glass house -- that was the alleged model that he used for CO2 gas). a good way of overcoming this conciet of the UNIPCC's computerized simulacra, is to look at the NYTimes weather page, wich always has a sort of random vingette on some aspect of the current weather: half the time, the records are for coolth!

--Give the Gift of Dick Cheeny -- out of office, at last!

[Janet Baraclough ..]

The message from animaux contains these words:

Significant climate change certainly is affecting areas where plants, animals and people live.

Janet. (UK)

[animaux]

Like I said, it doesn't have any relationship with how winter temperature fluctuations or unpredictable winter weather effects the south in the US. I also started off saying global warming is a definite problem.