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Naturalized Plantings of Bulbs in Landscapes
Plantings that Look Natural
Plant naturalized springtime bulbs for landscapes that are stunning in their simplicity, come alive with color, and repeat year after year. You probably have seen such floral displays.
Naturalized plantings are generously large, attractively mix several species of bulbs, or gloriously highlight a single species. They spring up as though erupting spontaneously from the soil without the hand of a gardener.
At its most basic, naturalizing means planting bulbs informally. Some throw markers over their shoulders without looking. They are trying to find an ideal and truly random broadcast of bulbs that mimic nature’s own patterns.
Nothing, though, is left to chance.
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Naturalized beds are more free-flowing than their formal counterparts. Curves replace straight lines, and the bed’s edges blend instead of meet.
Sinuous waves and random shapes, kidney and paisley patterns, or drifts that begin narrow, widen, and end in a single row of bulbs create drifts of color.
These plantings appear as if they were spilled by Mother Nature upon the landscape.
Design Elements
Though subtle, planned forms are hidden in these informal gardens. On a closer look, they have within their casual forms many of the elements as for formal plantings.
A winding cleft between two natural rises might be mirrored in parallel drifts of bulbs. Similar forms are planted in other landscape locations to repeat the existing curve provided by those rises.
For another option, mark triangles between groups of shrubs or trees, then use their points to plant trenches filled with drifts of naturalized bulbs.
Tips
Naturalize bulbs that are hardy in your climate. Avoid the need to lift and store scores of bulbs hidden in your landscape.
Many beautiful cultivars lose vigor in a season or two. Match them with crocus, narcissus, and species tulips that are hardy in your planting zone [see Bulb Basics].
It’s a good idea to choose bunching bulbs—bluebells, grape hyacinth, and snowflake, for instance. In a few seasons, they’ll naturally double and double again. Soon, your landscape will have hundreds of blooms where only a few dozen were planted.
Finally, match your naturalized bulbs to your site. Choose planting spots with the conditions bulb species need to thrive.
In areas prone to summer rain, shelter drought-loving summer bulbs beneath overhangs and deciduous trees. Choose quick-draining slopes and hills, especially those with open exposures that face towards the sun.
The History of Natural Gardens
Few stop to think about the natural-appearing gardens everyone admires for their casual and carefree styles.
They actually have a century’s long history. Western trade with the east in the 1700s introduced to Europe a design concept frequently seen in Chinese and Japanese gardens—symbolic naturalism.
It was a stark contrast with the formal western gardens of that time.
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Gardens following the east’s style might seem to be as natural as true wild settings.
They actually have underlying design principles based on fluid, sinuous forms, circles, and ovals that unify their elements. Formal gardens are more frequently based on golden rectangles, squares, and straight-sided triangles.
Over time, both design forms have grown in popularity.
It’s as common today to see a formal garden as one in which gardeners have planted naturalized beds of crocus, daffodil, hyacinth, and tulip in drifts along hillsides and beneath trees.
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