Fall Bulb Planting

The bulbs were tucked in a couple of weeks ago, but I'm just now getting to documenting. This year's order was motivated by the intent to raise the driveway/parking area bed another tier. The landscaping blocks are around 4 inches high, which meant I wouldn't have to "plant" the bulbs, but rather lay them on top of the previous soil and just dump soil on top of them to raise the soil level to the needed 4 plus inches of the new height.

This is my bulb order from Van Engelen Inc:
100 Chionodoxa gigantea (about 1/2 were planted in the driveway bed)
250 Crocus- Grand Collection
10 Muscari Ambrosiacum
10 Muscari macrocarpum Golden Fragrance
100 Muscari Magical Mix (whites & blues)
50 Hyacinthoides non-scripta (English Bluebells- planted in the Woodland Garden)

First thing I did was rest the Muscari (grape hyacinth) in an undulating pattern on top of the pre-existing soil. Previously I had covered the old bed with bone meal. Next I sprinkled a layer of compost over these bulbs so I could see where my pattern was in order to lay the next bulbs (crocus & chionodoxa) around this pattern. 

The compost was pretty hot. I hope it didn't harm the bulbs.

Compost from St Louis Composting.

Here you can see the crocus bulbs planted right on top of last year's mulch. I planted everything pretty thick. I'm hoping for a nice spring display.

Topped with compost. 

This was by far the easiest bulb "planting" I have ever done. Now this just needs a topping of mulch and the final layer of landscaping blocks. 

Looking forward to the results in Spring 2013!