Forcing bulbs—a deception, I should think. Making a plant think (if plants can indeed think) summer is back.
But who can resist hovering over brillant red red red at the far end of the produce department? Uh-huh, they are in the basket and home. Let’s call forcing a small luxury.
Forcing. Nothing more than a little manipulation, perhaps.
What is it in a plant that knows the way the world turns, its face always following the sun? Not exactly sentience. Definitely alive. But not smart.
I put them in a bright indirect light—south facing sun. The winter sun is low enough to fill the room. Still, I’ve never seen a tulip open that wide, wide, wider, as if by doing so there could be enough light in November for a tulip to survive. The petals dropped after two days in exhaustion.
We are currently on the wrong side of the solar sytem for tulips. They knew.
No wonder you cannot force a bulb two years in a row.
.
ExaaaAAAActly!
Ha-ha, wrong side of the solar system! Maybe that's why my tidy house keeps booming wider and wider with children's toys and projects of fun.
The moral to the bulb dilema: you can screw me once but you can't screw me twice.