Gladiolus Bulbs

Since gladiolus bulbs grow denser each year they are a good choice if you want a filled up colorful garden. You can play around with different pigmented gladiolus bulbs to add richness to your garden. In order to plant gladiolus add compost to the soil to make it more fertile and fit for gladiolus planting. Early spring is the right time to plant the gladiolus bulbs. Four to six inch holes are to be dug that should be four inches apart. These bulbs do not require too much water for survival and growth. Watering them once will be enough along with usual spring rains. The yellowed leaves and stalks are to be left as it strengthens the plant to produce the flowers the next year. Trim the stalks four to five inches by the end of summer.

There are plenty of types of gladiolus. Gladiolus Caeruleus grows to about 18 inches high and stalk has 6-8 buds and two bloomed light blue flowers at a time. This kind has deep violet spots on them and the flowers can survive in temperatures down to at least 27F. Gladiolus Carneus has three buds that bloom in a big light pink flower with three deep red darts in each flower. Gladiolus Huttonii has four buds and bloom into orange flowers with no fragrance. Gladiolus Trichonemifolius has yellow flowers and a fragrance. Gladiolus Watsonius is a small plant that produces one rust colored flower with no scent. There are a lot of varieties of these flowers and some of them bloom to the nature of the light while some do not have scents and some do.

Gladiolus can be a good choice to gift on special occasions as they are elegant and attractive. It can add height to a bouquet that includes other flowers as well but a bouquet of simple gladiolus looks good too. This is your guide to buy these flowers according to the season. Winter blooming gladioli are smaller than other species. Gladiolus tristis has a height of two feet tall with 18 inches long leaves. These are white and yellow flowers with a strong fragrance. Gladiolus Huttonii is also an example of winter blooming gladioli. Nanus hybrids or butterfly galdioli are popular commercially. They vary in hues of white, pink, rust and red and contain darts and dots on the petals. It has twelve buds on each stalk. Example of nanus hybrids is Gladiolus Colville.

Summer blooming gladioli include Gladiolus dalenii which is 15 inches high and one and half inch in diameter. Five to twelve spikes with flowers grow each season. The color palette consists of yellow to green or red to brown. It is widely available in warmer places as this kind has the tendency to grow in dry habitat as well with fewer wet seasons. Another example of summer blooming gladioli is Gladiolus Cruentus.

Juxtaposing to the summer blooming species gladioli, modern blooming hybrids or Grand flora has flowers of larger size. A stalk has about 10 flowers that are 5.5 inches in diameter. The colors range from pure white to jet black with textured flowers and tangled petals. The most customary colors are pink, salmon, red, yellow and purple. Similar species include Gladiolus cardinalis, Gladiolus cruentes, and Gladiolus papilio.