There are different sets of perks that come with having flowers planted in flower beds and flowers planted in pots. Both can be beautiful additions to your landscape, providing a variety of different design features and themes, transforming your yard into a work of art that you can take pride in.
Planting tulip bulbs in pots, instead of your normal flowerbed, will provide you with more options and versatility than a flowerbed might, specifically when dealing with smaller spaces, porches, decks, and the inside of your home.
However, there are a few tricks that will make the whole process easier, ones that will help your bulbs last longer, and come back year after year.
Bulbs need to be exposed to cold, to develop properly in the growing season. Tulips, more than most bulbs, require quite a lot of it compared to many other bulbs. For example, if you buy bulbs and grow them inside over the spring and summer, you're not going to be able to keep them indoors over the winter if you want them to grow back again.
Depending on the zone you live in, you're going to need to move the pot around throughout the hot and cold seasons, to make sure the bulb gets the temperatures it needs. If moving the pot around is too much, you can also dig up the bulb and store it separately over the winter to make sure it gets the conditions it needs to get new growth every year.
You're going to need to make sure that the pots you select have good drainage, as bulbs will rot if they're exposed to prolonged or excessive moisture. To take an additional step to help prevent bulb rot, use soil that drains well. Tulips, when they're growing, will need to get around 6 hours of sun a day, so you're going to need to make sure they don't dry out, but also that they don't retain too much water.
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Now that's you've got a grasp of the basics, let's go over some examples and give you a couple of ideas of some of the options you have!
1. Mix and Match Pastels
When you don't have the time, money, or desire to completely alter your landscape, using pots can be a great option to accomplish some of the same effects. For example, to create a staggering, sloped, or otherwise artificially shaped landscape, you would typically have to spend time adding dirt, digging holes, and doing quite a bit of other manual labor. With pots, you can replicate that effect quite simply, with fewer materials, and often with quite aesthetically pleasing results!
2. Use pots to start tulips' New Blooms
Pots are a great way to start blooms for many reasons. You know exactly how much moisture they're getting, you can move them around the get the sun they need, but perhaps the most crucial reason, protection from a large variety of pests.
While pots will most certainly not provide you will ironclad and perfect protection from all the different bugs, molds, and mammals that would be interested in feeding on your bulbs, it gives them a better chance of avoiding detection.
3. Spring in a Pot
Collect a variety of different colored tulips to fit a theme! You can plan for seasonal themes, something to match your interior decor or any combination of colors that suits your fancy! With such a variety of shades, colors, and heights, you're not going to have to try too hard to find a combination that works for you.
Use a neutral-colored pot or something that compliments the colors of the tulips to give it all the perfect finishing touch!
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4. Use planted tulips to decorate your home
Flowers are a beautiful, natural, and environmentally friendly way to decorate any space, whether it be interior or exterior. Even better are live flowers that you can bring inside, and will continue to provide color and calm day after day, as opposed to cut flowers, which will inevitably die and leave a mess.
5. Plant tulips in window boxes
Planting your tulips in pots and various containers gives you the option to put flowers and other plants in places where you wouldn't usually have the option. For example, window boxes are a fantastic alternative to directly planting the tulip bulbs in the ground.
It seemingly elevates the flowers out of the dirt, bringing the blossoms themselves to eye level because of their long stems. It's a great way to elevate nature and bring a new dimension to your landscaping.
6. Try planting tulip bulbs close to one another
When you plant bulbs in a pot, you can typically plant them pretty close together. Unlike seeds, where you generally won't be able to tell which ones will grow, you can usually determine whether or not a bulb is viable, making the planning the planting process much more efficient.
This can make for beautiful, seamless flower arraignments that may seem too dense, but so long as the bulbs aren't resting on top of each other when you plant them in the pot, they should be just fine. All in all, a gorgeous way to bring life to any area you choose!
7. Potted Plants Offer Pops of Color
A classically beautiful part of many landscapes are walls of hedges, different bushes, and ivy. While they make a great addition, they can also prevent you from planting many varieties of flowers in those spots as well, specifically the ones that need vertical space and can't vine, or fight for themselves.
Pots are an excellent solution to this problem! You can add pots to the side and plant the things in them that you wouldn't be able to otherwise, like tulips. It opens your landscape and garden up to many new possibilities!
8. Bring it Inside!
When it comes to the inside of your house, few ways are more effective than incorporating houseplants where bringing an air of comfort and relaxation to your home is concerned. And there are so many ways to do it!
You can use your potted flowers as centerpieces or accents, and the choice is entirely up to you!
9. Use pots to create an overflow of tulips
If you're going for a more natural look than pots will generally give, you can opt to cover them in many different ways. You can line the edges with draping plants that will cover it up, but if you choose that route, remember to make sure pick a plant with the same sun and water needs, and remember that there will be root space made unavailable to your tulips.
10. Or add a single tulip next to shorter flowers
Many industrial areas don't have room for flowerbeds or landscape projects, regardless of how elaborate or simple, they may be. Pots give you options where you may have none left! In heavily industrialized areas, a container full of plants can help clean the air and has been shown to help relieve stress.
11. Bunches of Tulip Blossoms Attract The Eye
With pots, you can create themes that you wouldn't be able to do otherwise. If you want to give your landscape a unique look, come up with your particular combination of interchangeable items that get included in a garden, like the pots, vegetation that doesn't get placed in pots, and other kinds of groundcover, whether it be bark, different types of rocks, or the living, green variety.
12. Use tulips in a pot as A Door Greeter
A beautiful pot of flowers is the perfect way to set an expectation and create a classic welcome for your home. Placed on a porch or patio where you wouldn't otherwise be able to present flowers, you can create quite a display based on the size of the pot in question.
Want to take it a step further? Take a look inside your house and figure out what your main color elements are if you don't know off the top of your head already. Then take a pot, place it just outside your door, plant flowers in it that match your interior design's color scheme.
13. Try planting tulips in baskets
Planting your tulips in pots comes with several perks, not the least of which involve mobility, individuality, and customization. One of those options? Putting your pots into baskets! This is especially helpful if you have mismatched pots and want a sense of uniformity without needing to go and purchase a whole new set of terra cotta for your flora.
14. Use decorative planters Indoors
One of the fun parts of utilizing pots is their many shapes. You can use the classic terra cotta pot, which comes in a very standard, traditional, and functional form, or you could use one of a plethora of other options.
For example, this cup-shaped, curved pot compliments very well the shape of the flower it holds. Smaller at the bottom, flaring out and then beginning to narrow again near the top. It's almost a homage to the flower itself, turning the entire presentation into a form of art and poetry.
15. Match the color of the container to the tulip variety
Want to take your customization a little further? Your only real limit is your imagination! So long as essential light, water, soil, and drainage requirements can be met, you can use any container you want, or decorate it in any way that fits your preferred decor and landscape styles.
16. Create seasonal shade arrangements
Do you know that you want to include pots in your landscape design, but you're having a hard time deciding which kinds of containers to buy? There are a couple of easy ways to pick the perfect pots that will give you the ideal theme in your yard.
For example, the option featured in the option pictured above. This person looked at some of the elements in their yard and found pots that were similar to them. The reddish-brown color of the pots beautifully matches the wall in the background, while the mottled design on the sides is reminiscent of the trees in the foreground.
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17. Blossoms of Red Tulips Can make decorative focal points
This pot of flowers has been put together beautifully. A white pot to compliment the white edging on the petals, white not contrasting or taking away from the vivid, scarlet red of the flower itself. Instead, the beautiful blossom is showcased.
Sometimes, the pot is a real work of art and can help the exhibition you want to put on with the plant inside. Other times, the pot can detract from the flower. In this case, the pot blends with its surroundings and is hardly noticeable, focusing on the flowers inside.
18. Place your tulip pots next to perennials
It can sometimes be hard to remember that you don't have to choose to either use only pots or only plant your flowers and other plants directly into the ground. You can have both, and doing so can create unique effects!
For example, this pot was placed in the middle of a flowerbed, growing the same flowers that are planted in the ground. It merely elevates an area of the garden to a new dimension, which can be a neat and attractive way to feature some choice blooms that you want to stick out amongst their peers.
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19. Use tulips for some Landscaping Art
Old fountains, birdbaths, and other vintage items may no longer serve the function that they were initially meant to, but that doesn't make them useless! You can adapt them as part of your theme, and help them become part of your landscape. Do a little research to figure out which plants will thrive in the location they're placed in, and turn something derelict into a work of art!
20. Coordinate the color of your tulips with the flowers next to them
With a brick path having edges right up to the side of the house, you usually wouldn't be able to plant flowers there. With pots, however, the chances open up! These purple and white blossoms right up against the side of this white house create a gorgeous staggered effect that would be difficult to replicate perfectly without pots.
We hope you enjoyed these 20 tips! If you can think of others, please leave us a comment to let us know!
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