I just planted some species tulips

We can grow many things in zone 9b, but for some plants, our winters are too mild. This includes tulips. Hybrid tulips, in particular — the showy, often gaudy and over-the-top kind. Sure, you can buy tulip bulbs in any nursery or garden center at this time of year, but the odds of success are middling at best. The reason is that hybrid tulips need a long, consistent cold period to trigger the hormonal process that develops flower buds. Even pre-chilled bulbs, sold at a premium, typically decline after a few years even if you do everything right: lift them at the end of spring, keep them dry all summer, and then put them in the fridge in September for 8 or 10 weeks before planting them out again.

Tulip house in Victoria, British Columbia. A common sight in many places, you’d never see a sea of tulips in mild-winter California.

Species tulips, or wild tulips, are a different story. They are the original, naturally occurring ancestors found in a vast region stretching from the Mediterranean through the Middle East to the foothills of the Himalayas. Unlike their heavily hybridized descendants, species tulips reliably naturalize for us: They don’t appear to have the strict chill-hour requirements as fancy hybrids, and they come back year after year, gradually multiplying and spreading to form a carpet of early-spring color.

In addition, they’re tough and resilient and, once established, need very little care. In fact, they prefer to be left alone in a sunny spot with well-draining soil — much like succulents. For that reason, tulips make good, if surprising, companion plants to aloes, agaves, and the like.

Species tulips have much smaller flowers than hybrids, but they’re more pollinator-friendly. Their open flowers are more accessible to bees and other pollinators and are a valuable early-season food source. In contrast, highly modified hybrid tulips are bred to be sterile so they produce no pollen or nectar. Even those that aren’t, often have thick petals that block access to nectar and pollen.

Tulipa saxatilis, a species tulip from Crete, the last time I grew it. I’d planted it in the wrong place — a clay-y spot that gets summer irrigation — and it rotted.

All of this must have been on my mind back in May when I apparently preordered a bunch of species tulips. I’d all but forgotten about them when a box from Beck’s showed up at the front door.

Tulip order from Breck’s

This what I ordered (all photos © Gardens Alive, Inc. d/b/a/ Breck’s):

Tulipa turkestanica

Tulipa ‘Lilac Wonder’

Tulipa ‘Little Princess’

Tulipa ‘Wild Blue Heart’

Learning from my past mistakes, I knew I had to plant the bulbs in well-drained sunny spots, ideally with little or no summer water that might cause the bulbs to rot.

This is where ‘Lilac Wonder’ and ‘Little Princess’ went:

‘Little Princess’ went here

‘Lilac Wonder’ went here

And I made sure to write labels for the four different types:

The consensus for our area seems to be to plant tulip bulbs in late November or December. This means I’m a little early, but I wanted to get this out of the way. I’m keeping my fingers crossed for good results. Of course I’ll post an update as soon as something is happening.

more info: This is a good article on “perennial” tulips.

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