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Bridal gown

 

In planting strips beneath trees and shrubs, spring-flowering bulbs have to compete with these woody plants. Obviously, only strong varieties will naturalize here, and they will also need favourable conditions: a substantial amount of light following the flowering period.
Limiting the choice to white-flowering varieties produces a kind of snowy effect in which several different white flowers appear consecutively among the freshly emerging spring foliage from early April to the end of May. The following varieties are mixed in advance and then planted in groups of various sizes:

Narcissi from early to late:

'Mount Hood'
(5% at a density of 15 bulbs/m²=18/yard²)
'Salome'
(5% at a density of 15 bulbs/m²=18/yard²)
'Thalia'
(10% at a density of 20 bulbs/m²=24/yard²)
'White Marvel'
(5% at a density of 20 bulbs/m²=24/yard²)
'Geranium'
(5% at a density of 15 bulbs/m²=18/yard²)
'Pueblo'
(10% at a density of 20 bulbs/m²=24/yard²)
'Petrel'
(10% at a density of 20 bulbs/m²=24/yard²)
N. poeticus recurvus
(10% at a density of 20 bulbs/m²=24/yard²)
Ornithogalum nutans
(20% at a density of 20 bulbs/m²=24/yard²)
Hyacinthoides hispanica 'Alba'
(20% at a density of 25 bulbs/m²=30/ yard²)

In the most favourable case (which is assumed here), the bulbs are planted in a natural-looking layer of herbaceous plants. As these plants grow to maturity, they will conceal the withering leaves of the spring-flowering bulbs from view. This herbaceous layer could be made up of a few varieties that balance each other in regard to vitality:

Aegopodium podagraria 'Variegata'

(10%)

Geranium nodosum

(15%)

Lamiastrum galeobdolon 'Herman's Pride'

(30%)

Vinca minor 'Marie'

(20%)

Waldsteina ternata

(25%)