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Cooperative Extension Service |
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Agricultural
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Dale Bumpers College
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| Dustin Blakey County Extension Agent - Agriculture |
Jesse Bocksnick County Extension Agent - 4-H |
[Dustin Blakey] Christmas is almost around the corner. Most people think about poinsettias when Christmastime comes, but you have many other options for plants. Today we’re going to discuss paperwhites.
Hi, this is Dustin Blakey with the Sebastian County Cooperative Extension Service.
[Picture of paperwhite flowers] Paperwhites are a bulb; they’re related to the daffodils we like to see come up in the spring. It’s a Narcissus. I’m going to show you how to plant some of these.
There’s 2 ways you can go about growing Narcissus - especially paperwhites. The reason why we choose paperwhites as opposed to other types of bulbs is they don’t require any type of chilling. [Picture of paperwhite bulbs] All they need is basically some water and they’ll start growing. [Dustin has in front of him bulbs, a pot, and potting soil]
One way you can grow them is to grow them directly in soil in a pot. This is just a regular florists’ pot, and that’s the way I prefer to do it. So I’ll show you how to plant some of them like this. First, get some soil. Don’t fill the pot all the way up. You want to use regular potting soil, peat-based potting soil. Get it about 1” from the top or so. Something like that.
This is a 5-1/2” container and I’m going to put 3 in although you could reasonably put 4 in and be fine. You don’t want to plant these deep. If you plant them deep, they’re just going to rot on you. So we’re going to do 3 in here…and you just want a little bit of soil on the outside here. Primarily the role of soil in growing these types of bulbs that you’re forcing is just to hold the plants up.
Again, make sure you haven’t planted them deep. You want the top of the bulbs showing out. Pack it in lightly. And that’s really all there is to it. Then you go ahead and water it in. I’ve got a nice, little saucer here so that we don’t make a big mess. [Title - Ensure your pot has drainage] Water it gently, and that’s really all there is to it.
You’ll probably want to use a more decorative pot than this, but another option you have is you can put into some attractive liner and you’re ready to go.
[Title slide] Planting paperwhites is continued in Part 2. Part 2 covers forcing bulbs in water.]
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