What to do with bluebell bulbs?

[BecauseImWorthIt]

This year I had masses of bluebells in the garden. I didn't plant them - I was amazed when they grew.

But they grew in the middle of other things I had planted, like my marjoram or my geraniums.

Now that they have finished flowering, I was pulling them up.

I've left the bulbs of those that are in the places I would be pleased to have bluebells, but I'm left with round two dozen bulbs of varying sizes.

For the moment they're in a pot, in a bucket with water, so that they don't dry out.

But as a novice gardener I'm not sure what I should do with them. I'd like to re-plant them in more appropriate places. Do I do that now or what? If not now, how do I store the bulbs?

TIA

I don't know specifically about bluebells but as a general rule you have to keep bulbs dry if they are out of the soil. I would plant them now where you want them, they have previously sat in the soil when you didn't know they were there!

i dug mine up and replanted where i wanted them - they seem to be doing ok. i can't see why it would be a problem as they must be fairly hardy and being in the ground is their natural place?

Just make sure they're English bluebells and not Spanish or Spanish hybrids. If they're either of the latter two, please destroy them as they are wiping out the native species.

You can tell the difference by looking at hte bells: on English bluebells they grow on just one side of the stem and they have scent. Spanish bluebells are more squat, bells grow on each side and they don't smell as nice. Here's a good site: www.whra.org.uk/bluebells.htm

Every year we destroy them and every year they come back. Near to us is a famous English bluebell wood and it is a real worry that these incomers will eventually get to them.

Stick em in the ground where you want them

On the Spanish/English thing. Interesting info in this article.

For anyone thinking of getting some English bluebells, please note the following:

1. Many many reputable bulb catalogues seem to sell Spanish bluebell bulbs, labelled as English

1. English bluebells are apparently very very fussy about where they grow - from that article - an so even if you did manage to get hold of proper English bluebell bulbs, they probably wouldn't grow anyway.

The only answer AFAICS, is that unless you live in a very specific sort of woodland area, you need to expunge all of your bluebells.

From the article:

"The British bluebell is intensely choosy about where it grows because it is dependent upon a specific fungal environment generated from rotting leaf-matter, which is called Mycorrhiza arbusculus for lack of a more specific name. Without the assistance of the fungus, the native bluebell cannot synthesise the nutrients necessary for growth.

This very circumstance suggests that it is missing something from its genetic code as the Spanish bluebell is not. In Darwinian terms, the Spanish bluebell is the fitter, and the English bluebell will need all our help if it is to hold its own.

To grow Spanish bluebells represents more of a threat to the survival of the native form than digging it up in the wild, which is pointless anyway, because, without its attendant Mycorrhiza, the transplanted bluebell will die. Suppliers of native bluebells in the green should know this and almost certainly do, in which case their operations are hardly less cynical than those of the distributors of the Dutch-grown Spanish bluebell bulbs that are now flooding the market."

Spanish bluebells are the divvil's work. They are total thugs and spread unbelievably fast. Do the right thing and get rid of them.

We should have a MN campaign.

Germaine Greer had one a few years ago in the Telegraph and that's how we found out about Spanish bluebells.

Aaargh! How do I tell if they're Spanish or English now they've stopped flowering?!

Hmmmm

How about just checking when they come up next year and disposing if necessary? You already have bluebells in the garden, so a dozen more won't make much difference, then once you know what you're dealing with you can decide whether to get rid or not.

Don't know though, someone else may have better ideas.

Hmm. I'm suspecting that the way they appeared/spread means that they probably were the invasive Spanish ones, so I won't re-plant them.

Instead, I'm going to look out for English bulbs and plant those instead.

The Spanish bluebells have very big fleshy white bulbs.

Be careful with English bluebell bulbs - as per my earlier post, even reputable bulb specialists are passing Spanish bluebells off as English ones.

The whole bluebell thing is a minefield IMO