Will My Tulips Come Back Year After Year? The Experts Answer
When the first tulips burst into bloom on a balmy day, you know spring has arrived! First cultivated as early as the 10th century, tulips were introduced to Europe in the 16th century. Today, about 95 percent of all tulips are grown in the Netherlands to supply gardeners around the world.
There are thousands of different varieties of these gorgeous spring-blooming bulbs. But if you’ve ever planted these bulbs in the fall and enjoyed their flowers one year, only to be disappointed in subsequent years by lackluster (or no!) blooms, you’re not alone.
“Whether or not tulips will come back year after year depends on many different factors, such as the tulip variety, the weather, and the growing conditions,” says Dave Dowling, cut flower specialist with Ball Seed. “It’s not predictable.”
Tulips do have specific needs to grow well. “They do best in well-drained soils, and they need a period of cold weather with temperatures remaining 35 to 45 degrees for 12 to 18 weeks, depending on the tulip variety,” says Daniel Schavey, owner of Petal Pickers Flower Company. “Because of their cold requirements, they can be tricky to grow in warmer climates.”
Unfortunately, garden visitors such as deer and voles also love tulips, so it’s entirely possible your tulips won’t even make it through the first year if neighborhood deer or tunneling rodents find them. “Once voles find tulip bulbs, they’ll devour them all,” says Dowling.
Read on to learn more about whether or not tulips can be grown reliably as perennials:
Are Tulips Annuals or Perennials?
Actually, the answer is both! “Technically and botanically, tulips are perennials if given the right conditions,” says Dowling. But they usually bloom well only the first year, then tend to push out small, unimpressive blooms—or no blooms at all—in subsequent years. In many cases, only the foliage will come back after the first season.
In addition, where you live plays a part. Tulips do best in USDA Hardiness zones 3 to 7 (find your zone here), which is where you have the best chance of repeat blooms. You can get tulips to bloom in zone 8 if you pre-chill the bulbs for a specific period of time.
You will need to pre-chill the bulbs yourself before planting, or you can purchase pre-chilled bulbs from some nurseries. Regardless, these flowers are grown as annuals in the warm climates because they don’t perform well in the heat and humidity year after year, says Schavey.
How to Get Tulips to Come Back Every Year
While there are a few tips for encouraging tulips to perennialize, getting tulips to return is largely luck. “Don’t count on them,” says Dowling. “Treat them as annuals, and if they do come back, it’s a bonus.”
A tulip bulb starts out as a solid mass, which uses all its energy to create the flowers. However, if you cut the bulb open in mid-summer when the foliage is dead, their papery shells contain 3 to 4 smaller “daughter” bulbs, which are about the size of acorns. These petite bulbs are not mature enough to bloom the following year, though they may do so in subsequent years, says Dowling. This is how new tulip bulbs are harvested by growers.
You can leave these bulbs in place, if you like, or dig them up, store in a cool, dark place, and replant elsewhere in the fall. But remember it may take a few years for them to grow as big as the original bulb and bloom, says Dowling. Anything can happen in the meantime to discourage rebloom (getting eaten, too wet, too dry, and so on).
That being said, it doesn’t hurt to at least try to keep tulips going from year to year. Follow these tips from Dowling and Schavey to give your tulips their best chances at a repeat performance:
Plant them in the right spot in full sun (6 or more hours of direct sunlight).
Let the foliage die back naturally. The bulb needs to photosynthesize and make food. Once the leaves are totally yellow and pull away easily, you can remove them.
Don’t let the bulbs stay wet all summer. They don’t like to stay soggy, so make sure the soil is well-draining and that they are not located in an area where they get constant water from irrigation.
Feed them a few times a season to help give the bulb a boost. You can use compost or a granular bulb fertilizer.
What Types of Tulips Are Most Likely to Be Perennial?
Although there are no guarantees, these varieties of tulips have a better chance of perennializing in your garden if conditions are ideal:
Greigii
Kaufmanniana
Species
Emperor tulips
Giant Darwin hybrid tulips
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