Ep 197. Favorite Spring Planted Bulbs - Koleen’s Corncob Robber

Mary Stone shares her design colleague and dear friend Marty Carson’s favorite summer flowering bulbs to plant in spring, adding a few other hardy deer-resistant corms to the list. A discussion on using bone meal while planting bulbs as a squirrel deterrent leads to Koleen’s saga of a typo in a description of corn she ordered from a seed catalog, which turned into a humorous squirrel dilemma. 

Mary concludes by sharing her concern for her friend Marty after a recent emergency surgery. Life can change in a moment. Let us cherish every single day and season of our lives.

Related Posts and Podcasts you'll enjoy:

Favorite Spring Planted "Bulbs" - Blog Post 

Phil’s Squirrel Dilemma

Bulbs to Extend Spring Blooms - Blog Post 

Ep 81. Bulbs Extending Blooms & Deterring Squirrels

8888

I'd love to hear your garden and nature stories and your thoughts about topics for future podcast episodes. You can email me at AskMaryStone@gmail.com.

You can Follow Garden Dilemmas on Facebook and Instagram #MaryElaineStone.
Episode web page —Garden Dilemmas Podcast Page

Thank you for sharing the Garden of Life,
Mary Stone, Columnist & Garden Designer
                                        AskMaryStone.com

More about the Podcast and Column:

 Welcome to Garden Dilemmas, Delights, and Discoveries.

 It's not only about gardens; it's about nature's inspirations, about grasping the glories of the world around us, gathering what we learned from Mother Nature, and carrying these lessons into our garden of life. So, let's jump in, in the spirit of learning from each other. We have lots to talk about.

Thanks for tuning in, Mary Stone 
Garden Dilemmas? AskMaryStone.com
Direct Link to Podcast Page

Transcript

Ep 197 Spring Planted Bulbs-Koleen’s Cob Robber
Sat, Mar 08, 2025 2:58PM • 12:18
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
Spring planted bulbs, corms, squirrel deterrent, bone meal, garden dilemmas, holly branches, freesia, crocosmia, liatris piccata, blazing star, Marty Carson, Koleen Garland, colored corn, squirrel story, garden inspiration.
SPEAKERS
Mary Stone, Koleen Garland

Mary Stone  00:00
Mary, Hello, fellow lovers of all things green. I'm Mary Stone, and welcome to garden dilemmas, delights, and discoveries. It's not only about gardens. It's about nature's inspirations, about grasping the glories of the world around us, gathering what we learn from mother nature, and carrying these lessons into our garden of life. So let's jump in, in the spirit of learning from each other. We have lots to talk about.

Mary Stone  00:23
Hello there. Welcome to the screen porch. It's Mary Stone. We had a deluge of rain yesterday. These early March temperatures are cool, but not cold, and so that heavy rain was not snow, as I hoped it would be. Speaking of, I heard from my writer friend, Koleen, who lives in Canada, whose stories we've enjoyed previously, such as her hilarious Dandelion Wine story featured in episode 157 - Benefits of Plantain and Dandelion Weeds. She sent me a new story when her snow piled up to 10 feet high. It involves a typo of corn that she ordered from a seed catalog that turned into a squirrel dilemma. Her story relates to the topic of spring planted bulbs, I look forward to sharing. But first, a quick thanks to those who wrote back after our last chat about encouraging indoor blooms of hope. Many of you went out and clipped branches of spring-flowering woody plants. I did, too, and I added some holly branches so that even before the blooms, the display is lovely. Plus, Holly bears fruit and remains green all winter, which is why it's a symbol of immortality. So that makes me happy. We spoke about the legend of holly and Christmas trees in episode 139. So, on to this week's story, and it starts like this.

Mary Stone  01:50
Hello, fellow lovers of all things green. I enjoyed an outing to Paper Mill theater in Millburn, New Jersey, which allowed me to brain pick my design colleague and friend Marty about her favorite summer flowering bulbs to plant in spring. Since my snow dance didn't seem to work, it's time to start thinking about the fun of spring. Marty favors freezia. I didn't realize until researching them that they aren't bulbs. Rather, they are corms, which are similar. Both are underground storage units, as are tubers and rhizomes, but bulbs are, well, bulbous and layered inside like an onion, whereas corms are flatter. When you dig up a corm in the fall, spent ones are withered up, each clinging to the new corm. Crocus and Gladiolus are also corms. So that is spelled C, O, R, M, S - corms. So there's a bit of, I don't know, what would you say? That's a bit of the Anatomy of underground storage units of plant material. It's such fun to learn about, isn't it?

Mary Stone  02:57
Hardy in zones nine to 10, like dahlias and most gladiolas, freesia must be dug up each fall in our zone 5b to 6 and stored over winter. That's an unlikely routine for me to embrace. I admitted to Marty, though over the years, I've had Dahlia loving clients with stunning gardens packed with the beauties. Their passion for caring for their dahlias is like tending to a beloved pet, a flowering pet, and I certainly understand that.

Mary Stone  03:29
 Freesia is a popular cut flower because of its sweet smell and long lasting blooms, each 12 to 15 inch stem showcases a dozen trumpet like Flowers. They come in an array of colors, including lavender, purple, orange, red, pink, white, cream, and yellow. Freesia planted in the spring will provide a glorious late-summer display. Be sure to plant them in groups of eight to 10, about two inches apart, for a beautiful presentation. Better yet, why not plant them in pots? So lazy Mary that would be me can merely bring them in the garage and store them over winter. Brilliant idea. But when planting them, I'll have to be sure the containers are tall, as freesia has long tap roots. Big feet, as my dear old mama would say, who gave me my garden start.  

Mary Stone  04:19
Another lazy Mary tip: why not plant the stunning deer-resistant Crocosmia corms come spring? They're hummingbird magnets with bright orange, red, and yellow arching flowers. They stand tall, about three feet, with sword-like foliage, and won't require digging up in the fall, as they happily overwinter here. That is also true of liatris piccata, which is a North American Native blazing star is the common name, and they attract so many butterflies, plus they look awesome as cut flowers. And they bloom late in summer and look lovely with Rudbeckia, which is Black Eyed Susan, and Mums - or dahlias, if you are The kind that likes to have pets that you dig up each year. But again, the blazing star can stay in the ground in our neck of the woods, and it'll come back year after year.

Mary Stone  05:12
I asked Marty about using bone meal as a squirrel deterrent when planting the bulbs and corms and such. It also serves as a fertilizer. I used to use bone meal, but dogs love it, she said, as I pictured Marty's canine kids digging up the bulbs as she planted them. Instead, she uses Pro Start, 233, by North Country Organics. She mixes it with the soil and plants her bulbs to ensure healthy root development. It's the phosphorus, which is also in bone meal, that encourages happy roots. And there's nothing more wonderful than having happy roots, isn't there? Garden dilemmas, AskMaryStone.com. 

Mary Stone  05:56
So the bone meal trick to deter squirrels from digging up bulbs is the perfect segue to share Koleen's story that she recorded for me. Take it away, Koleen. 

Koleen Garland  06:08
it's the end of February, and the snow is piled 10 feet high. The sun is trying to find a tiny place to shine through the constant overcast. This storm has lasted so long that the mail-order garden books have come out in full force; back issues and all the catalogs are notably full of pictures of beautiful produce and handy tips and tricks, and are usually spot on with descriptions expectations quickly send to gardeners like me into Dream Land and have us blind to the outdoors. But two years ago, the catalog sent me an experience. A lovely photo of colored corn sent my mind on a different path. The illustration was of five beautifully mixed colored corn cobs. The husks turned back to show the wonderful, long rows of kernels. But the explanation under the picture was the clincher. It said the plant was three feet tall. Eureka. I couldn't resist

Koleen Garland  07:02
That spring came early, and the world bounced into bloom. My catalog order came into the music of the homecoming birds and the belligerent chatter of a red squirrel, whom I had aptly named Slim. I eagerly planted two rows of the corn, each about 12 feet long.

Koleen Garland  07:19
In our part of the world, there's an old saying that in order to be a good crop of corn, it has to be up to your knees by July 1. The colored corn was heading that way. No doubt about it, I was going to have a bumper crop. In fact, it was stretching, no streaking, heavenwards. By July 1, it was up to my waist and still going strong. We watched in amazement as it kept getting taller and taller throughout the summer, the bird house above it totally disappeared. The catalog had lied. The seed pack had lied. The corn ended up to be not three feet tall, but 13 feet tall, a typo had given me and probably a lot of others an experience indeed, but it was beautiful corn, and for some reason, the raccoons didn't indulge when the cobs were full. Harvest time was lovely, long, beautifully variously colored cobs to use on whatever decoration I chose. My best was a basket of gourds set off with a beautiful corn, which I placed on the dining room table.

Koleen Garland  08:25
The weather was cooling. I heaped the perennial gardens with leaves, and while doing it, I found a piece of the siding of the house had come loose. Handyman, hubby immediately nailed it back into place with five-inch screw nails. Bit of an overkill, I thought, but definitely nothing was going to get in. The next day, we headed for a quick vacation before winter. On our return, we tumbled into our home happy to get through an early snowfall. We checked on how the house had fared while we were away. Everything looked lovely, but why was the harvest centerpiece not on the table? There had been three dried colored corn cobs in the basket, and they were so pretty. I left them there while we were away, but they weren't there now.

Koleen Garland  09:08
I checked my downstairs sewing room, and there on the stairs were two cobs completely stripped of kernels. E gad I froze - rats. Oh, how I hate rats. But no, now that I thought of it, those cobs were stripped, just like the cones under the spruce trees - a squirrel.

Koleen Garland  09:28
The next day, we were surprised to wake up and find a stripped corn cob sitting in front of the living room fireplace. Oh, the frustration. Where was he getting in

Koleen Garland  09:38
We live trapped Slim in front of the fireplace, and never had I seen a squirrel so angry. He scurried away when we released him outside. We scoured the house to find where he had gotten in. Every inch was inspected. There were simply no secret holes, and that in itself was the answer. When we pieced the puzzle together, we realized that before we fixed the house, we had not heard Slim outside.  Without realizing it, Slim had already made our house his. We had not nailed him out. We had nailed him in.

Koleen Garland  10:17
Slim had to stay out for the winter, but I gave in and served him colored corn cobs at the bottom of the birdhouse. They disappeared immediately, and Slim appeared the next spring in his usual belligerent temperament. But one season of 13-foot-high corn was enough. Sorry, Slim, but there will be no warm fireside corn on the cob evenings for you anymore. 

Mary Stone  10:40
So there you go: making the best of a typo, finding humor in garden and Critter dilemmas, and accepting their role in our lives. Sometimes, the best thing to do about garden dilemmas is to laugh. Thank you, Koleen.

Mary Stone  10:58
A quick side note here: my friend, Marty Carson, had an emergency surgery, and she's done quite well with it. She is in recovery, but I have to say, it's hard when you see a friend have a problem, and I pray that her recovery goes smoothly. It makes me realize how quickly life can change, and so may we always cherish every single day, every single season, and look at every flower in our lives as a real treat and a real miracle. So thank you for coming by and joining me and sharing this time together. I really do appreciate it, and I hope I hear from more of you, because I do love hearing your storyies. So email me at askmarystone@gmail.com. I look forward to the next time on the screen porch. Have a great day. 

Mary Stone  11:49
You can follow Garden Dilemmas on Facebook or online at Garden dilemmas.com and on Instagram at hashtag. Mary Elaine Stone. Garden Dilemmas Delights and Discoveries is produced by Alex Bartling. Thanks for coming by. I look forward to chatting again from my screen porch, and always remember to embrace the unexpected in this garden of life. Have a great day.