Joebass said:If it is a dark dish towel that doesn't let light through. If the bulb sees enough light it will likely sprout a leaf and you are trying to get the bulblet as big as you can before using energy to sprout leaves. This year I had a bulblet start to put out a tiny leaf while the bulblet was small. I pinched off the leaf and I made sure it was in a dark place at which point the bulb started bulking up and using more of the scales reserves to build the new bulblet.
Joe, when I weigh one thing against another, it being August 5th and all, I would be inclined to pot them up now and obtain as many leaves as possible before they have to be put into winter resting/chill cycle. For every new little leaf that shows, that's another little scale. We're working against the clock here. I would pot the scales with bulblets attached just as they are in the picture. Plant about 1/2 to 3/4 inch deep. The little scaled bulblets will be dual nurtured by both mother scale and the potting mix. The root system will develop faster as well and soil nurturing will soon out pace scale nurturing and the bulblet will discharge the old scale, used up or not. If we figure the growth cycle deadline as Nov 15th, we've got a good 80 to 90 natural growing days until chill. What I am afraid would happen if we continued to grow the bulblets on the scales, they would eventually start growing leaves in the bags at some point anyway. And if they start that, it's hard to stop. They wouldn't be conditioned for the chill and growth is likely to continue, even in the dark chill. That's a real mess and a failure because those bulblets will not survive once chilled and potted or potted and chilled, either way.
A good time to let a bulblet grow on the mother scale as long as possible is with Fall scaling that's done in late October-November time frame. In that case, time is on our side, and we can get nice, big bulblets without green growth with plenty of time left to chill.
