I'll see if I can get a picture, but you all will know what I'm talking about.

I decided to make a cutting garden for my seven year old granddaughter Jenna, partly to keep her from cutting every flower in sight, but so she could have flower bouquets to take home.

I got bags of hyacinths from Netherland Bulb, 100 bulbs total , I think, and planted them tightly together in rows.

Well, this week she wated to pot one up and take it home so it would bloom at home. It's almost ready to bloom. Very early for us. .

When we dug it, there were tons of little bubils around the bulb, and we even cut some off by mistake.

Is this normal for a hyacinth? Had it been a species tulip, or maybe a lily, I wouldn't have been surprised, but I never knew hyacinths to multiply quickly like that. Is it because they are packed in so tightly I put them into survival mode?

Any thoughts on this?

Interesting! I don't recall ever having had that happen, but then, I rarely dig them once they're in the ground. But I think I'd see little foliage around the mother bulb if it had occurred. This has me thinking of a thread Leftwood started on DG about planting bulbs shallowly to promote increase- do you recall how deeply you planted them? Another idea comes to mind; I've read the basal plate of some bulbs can be scored, and that will promote bulblet formation. Perhaps the bulb received an injury at the basal plate at harvest.

I suspect I planted it shallowly. As this one is the first to bloom. I planted them at various depths hoping Jenna would have hyacinths for quite a while.

I don't think I've ever dug them once they were in the ground before.

It may also have received in injury.

I'll be taking up a few more for her to take home in a week or so, and will check this out.