Does anyone have a system when growing small bulbs. I received my L. nepalense and they are about the size of a pea. Should you fertilizes them every time you water with 1/2 amt. of recommended fertilizer, or will that cause them problems? If I let them grow normally it will take many years to bloom.

Mike, i go with a weak 'fish emulsion' mix, every 2-3 weeks[when watering or raining].,.,.also, your seedlings are loving it[especially the 'henryi' cross's]

I have trouble using any fish emulsion/sea emulsion mix outside. The raccoons go nuts and tip my pots over and dig in them thinking there is a fish feast in the bottom of them or something. I have used a 1-1-1 vegan solution that has worked well. Or a very low numbered, very dilute fertilizer.

I had the same experience with raccoons the one and only time I used it. I got up the next morning and my garden looked like a bunch of wild hogs had been in there--just mutilated everything!! I had just planted two new little plum trees also and used it on them too--which they tore completely out--which I promptly replanted--and they promptly tore them out again the next night. So that was the end of the fish emulsion for me.

Another product I had tough luck with is that cocoa bean shell mulch. I stacked a couple bags in the driveway one morning; came back in the afternoon and there was nothing left but a small pile with the bags chewed beyond recognition. There were a half dozen or so squirrels busy working when I drove in, tho I later found out dogs like it too.

Thanks for the info

I think Anthony's fertilizer regime is a safer bet.

Roosterlorn said: I later found out dogs like it [cocoa bean mulch] too.

Chocolate is supposedly poisonous for dogs. At least that's what PETA and some customers say to us at the Home Depot. They made such an uproar that we don't sell it anymore because there isn't a "caution" label warning pet owners.

Yet another example of people (in this case certain individual dog owners) not taking responsibility for themselves or the their dogs.

You may have to send me over a 'coon hat ,.,.My biggest problem -s here are ,blackbirds, my blatant seedling tramper cat 'sooty' and believe it, a 'copper hen' last saturday morning, escaped the 'bretheran house' nearby.,.

We use lead posioning for raccoons and rabbits. It thins down their numbers if Dan is on target. I had a problem with wild chickens digging up my seedlings when we first moved out to the farm, but eventually, they all went to that great chicken farm in the sky. I wasn't sorry to see the rooster be the first to go. 3:30 - 4:00 am that thing would go off. We have deer, but if I can interrupt their trails early enough in the season I have less problems with them. Plantskydd, Deer Fortress and Electric Deer Fence tends to discourage them quite a bit. I try to collect the fallen apples from our trees and haul them down to the far end of the west pasture and it keeps temptation under control.