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Dig Once, Plant Twice

Layered bulb-planting ensures a lively springtime display.

Daffodil bulbs from half a dozen different mail-order companies landed on my back porch, followed by a couple of 50-bulb tulip collections. The garden center had some new Asiatic and Oriental lilies I couldn’t pass up. And somewhere in my travels, I’d purchased a hundred or so muscari, scilla, chionodoxa, and allium bulbs. It was easy to envision the beauty of my spring garden as I thumbed through catalogs and perused the garden center bins, but getting all those bulbs into the ground takes some serious work.

My grandmother frequently chided me for “biting off more than you can chew,” especially in the garden. I can just see her now, chuckling and shaking her head at my current project.

Peppermint Stick and tall Pink Impression tulips are a lovely combination for the bulb-layering method.

As a regular glutton for punishment, I’ve learned some timesaving shortcuts and efficiencies in the garden, though. One of them is the trench method for planting bulbs. I find it easier to dig one big hole that’s wide enough to accommodate a group of bulbs instead of digging individual holes. A 50-bulb tulip collection, for example, needs a 10-square-foot hole, 6 to 8 inches deep.

The best and most efficient part of trench planting is that it allows for bulb layering. After I set all the tulips or daffodils in the bottom of the trench, I cover them with a couple of inches of soil and then plant some smaller bulbs in the same hole. Viola! Dig once and plant twice.

Layering is great for combining bulbs with similar bloom times to get a beautiful and easy display. Some of my favorite combos include:

Dwarf iris with snowdrops or snow crocus
Early emperor tulips with scilla or chionodoxa
Daffodils with muscari or giant crocus
Miniature daffodils with early to mid-season tulips
Tall tulips with shorter tulips
Tall alliums with shorter alliums
Windflowers with daffodils or tulips

Large crocuses and early Tête-à-Tête daffodils bloom together and can be planted in the same trench.

Digging one hole and planting two or more bulbs that bloom in different seasons is another way to use time and space efficiently. I think of this method as “fireworks planting”: just as one bloom is finishing, another is coming up to take its place. Consider a few of these combinations:

Daffodils or tulips and summer-blooming lilies
Daffodils or tulips with alliums
Early Asiatic lilies with late-summer Oriental lilies
Crocus and Dutch iris
Early emperor tulips with late-blooming tulips
Spring or summer-blooming bulbs with autumn crocus or colchicum

The trick to successful bulb layering is to plant each type at the correct depth. Put the largest bulbs at the bottom and add enough soil for the next smaller bulb, and so forth. When I plant bulbs of the same size together, such as daffodils and lilies, I put them at the same depth, but may use different spacing. Daffodils, for example, are planted 6 inches apart, while Oriental lilies are spaced 10-12 inches apart.

I may be a glutton for punishment, according to Gramma, but my spring garden is a feast for the eyes!

Last updated: 06/29/2023