Mid Spring flower tour: How year 2 perennials are doing (zone 7a)

Spring is here and it’s showing on the farm! We are seeing a lot of growth as the day time temperatures get warmer, especially amongst our 2nd year, short living perennials. I’ve always wondered how 2nd year, short living perennials perform. Questions I’ve had included:
1. Do they flower again in the following year?
2. If so, what is the quality of the blooms. Are they more abundant?
3. Do they flower more quickly?
I hope to be able to answer all of these questions this year but in the meantime, we look at how much growth they’ve put on, and in some cases we can compare relative to year 1 transplants that were overwintered last fall.
Want to purchase the same lily bulbs that I'm growing in this video? You can find the link here! bit.ly/44s6v4o
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[@andreasimpson1018]

The relay planting is a genius idea. I’m going to integrate that into my plans this year.

[@bareflowerfarm]

Yay!! I can’t believe how little info there is out there on this but so many people are interested in this and intercropping with plants. I’m considering starting a fbook group for people to share!

[@Kathywake23]

The umbrella flower shape is called an umbellifer. Learned that from Francis on Gardeners World. Ahat a gem.

[@bareflowerfarm]

It has a name! (of course it does)- thanks for sharing, I love to know things like this!

[@toniasgarden3550]

I did the succession planting of the tulips and lilies last fall as well, it worked out great this year! I plan on doing it with crates this fall...it actually made my lilies grow a bit taller...

[@Riti_Roots]

Oooh that’s exciting. I plan to try and succession plant some tulips in the fall but have analysis paralysis! Just got to do it. What tulips did you grow?

[@bareflowerfarm]

Yes! Just gotta do it. Honestly, it doesnt matter what tulips you grow, I find all tulips to be sellable, especially to retail customers.

[@toniasgarden3550]

@bareflowerfarm I also snuck into one of my rows of Ranuculous some stock. Everything is doing well so far-

[@cbak1819]

My foxglove in 6a came back for 4 years.. made babies. But I'm allergic so I took them out. They were 5-6 ft. tall. My first year growing yarrow.. there not doing much.. but looking forward to them. Thanks for this info💜

[@BlommaFlowerCo]

I’ve been doing the relay planting for a few years now. I have never found info on it, just experimenting myself. I like to do Lizzie and ranuncs together.

[@bareflowerfarm]

Oh that’s interesting and smart on the Lizzie’s! I assume by the time the Lizzie’s take off the ranunculus have died back?

[@cbak1819]

Thank fir the offer of lilies!

[@clairegill7891]

I love these experiments you do! So interesting 🌸 some of my lilies last year flowered lovely but a few of them looked distorted no idea why 🤔 the flowers looked weird 🤣

[@bareflowerfarm]

It's hard to tell without a photo. Could be lack of watering, pest, disease or even a bulb issue

[@HikeMichigan]

Great video! Looking forward, with you, to see how those overwintered lilies flower.

[@bareflowerfarm]

Thank you! And looking forward to sharing g

[@lisabeachy8257]

Another great video! I'm learning so much and am going to try the raised bed relay planting this fall. Thank you for sharing your knowledge.

[@bareflowerfarm]

So glad to hear. Let me know how it goes if you try this raised bed relay planting method!

[@kcoop6888]

I bought some of the white double yarrow from them after your video last year and planted it late here in Maine and it still bounced back and is pumping out growth already

[@bareflowerfarm]

Yes!! They’re champs! I got so worried bc they were completely chowed down but the root systems were so robust they made it back!

[@jeffcady284]

@@bareflowerfarmhard to kill yarrow. It will spread to places you did not plant it at. I have patched 30 ft or more from where they were planted.

[@mhubertcfi]

Those all look so good. I'm hopeful for my second year ptarmica yarrow. Last year was too short. The other thing I've been interested in lately is making a self-sufficient supply of bulbs. I don't want to be reliant on Holland due to diseases etc (and profit margins) so I'm interested in how big the tiny divided lily bulbs that I planted last year will get as well as how long it takes daffs and tulips to divide and make curable sized flowers. The idea is you harvest a portion of the bulbs and let the others divide for further years. I would love to know if devoting some space to that will make enough money in not having to buy bulbs. It seems like it might be a three year cycle but we'll see. Great video as always ❤ I actually find that my perennialized lillies produce stems that are so big they are almost unusable after the second year so are best for mother plants. After year two the bulbs can be the size of a softball

[@bareflowerfarm]

Thanks Melissa! I totally hear you about wanting to divide bulbs. I think for the amount I’m growing, it’s just not possible to try to self reproduce but I think for someone doing a few hundred, it’s totally doable esp since you can plant on top of tulips when they are done. And good to know about the lilies, I would think it would make more sense to actually cut them with less leaves to photosynthesize as a way to encourage them to not grow so massive!

[@jeffcady284]

Tulips are not very reliable to perenialize. Lilies are very reliable. They both seem to diminish in numbers over the years, though.

[@janetmiller22]

How will you handle the lily/tulip bed next year? Leave the lillies in and just put tulip bulbs in top? I tried some lasagna-ing this year in planters for myself. Not too happy with those results.

[@bareflowerfarm]

Hi Janet! I plan to take all of the lilies out but repeat this in the fall with new lily bulbs and tulips. I will also be taking out the soil to avoid tulip fire. So far, the majority of the lilies show strong sturdy stems. What happened with your results?

[@brandyduval5514]

Hello! With succession planting every year for lilies do you buy new bulbs each season or can you store them for the next year ?

[@bareflowerfarm]

Hi! I buy new bulbs every few weeks. The cooler I have is a regular fridge and isn't worth it for me to try to hold the spent bulbs. You can also perennialize these bulbs which I do some of, but I plant way too many. Since I cant use 400 of a single variety myself every few weeks, that's why I sell them in 25/50 increments to the smaller scale grower.

[@everafterflowerfarm]

I thought foxgloves were biennial. I had no idea they'd come back for another year.

[@bareflowerfarm]

That was what I was trying to figure out! I was told by may people they would come back. So far, they are tracking to come back so we shall see how those blooms look!

[@jacquelinelykins4485]

I know this is a question that I should already know but how do you force tulips and lilies?

[@bareflowerfarm]

It's actually not something you should feel like you should already know. Forcing tulips is a complex, advantaged techniques. Forcing lilies is a bit more straight forward. I took workshops for best. These two videos may help give you a bit more information before you decide if you want to take the online workshops: Lilies: kzbin.info/www/bejne/a6nUfX6ioduVbqssi=U-PmP4boAXfy0ZeU Tulips: kzbin.info/www/bejne/m3bXp2qOfK9lf6ssi=vteBSHO7sR6uISen

[@EmiStefan]

Will lilies be able to handle the last frost? Or do you cover them?

[@bareflowerfarm]

If it goes down to just 32 and no buds with about an hour of frost, it’s fine. But if it was sustained for a few hours we would need to bring inside or cover

[@lindaalbano6868]

My son wanted to buy white lilies and it’s 6 dollars a stem

[@bareflowerfarm]

That’s why you should grow them 😁. Bulbs will usually retail for over $1 each, I sell white lily bulbs for under $1. But a $6/stem lily is not unreasonably priced for retail especially if it has a lot of buds!

[@EmiStefan]

Wait, so carnations are biennials??

[@bareflowerfarm]

They can be hybridized to be annual, biennial or perennial 😅