Preparing the garden for Sparaxis

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I ordered the Sparaxis Big Party Mix from Easy to Grow Bulbs yesterday, and I got out and started to prepare their future home in the garden. I don't know anything about Sparaxis, just thought that they looked nice on the site, and a little bit of research told me that they should be happy here at The Tropical Paradise.

From what I have read, they like a nice warm, sunny area, and I have just the place for them. In fact, I've tried to grow lots of stuff there and it just fails, so it would be great if something would succeed there. It's in the southeast corner of my garden in an area that gets very little shade. I have a Phoenix rupicolaxreclinata palm tree planted there, which is doing well, and some companion plants would look nice.

From what I have read, Sparaxis are from South Africa and like it dry and hot, which is what we have here. South African plants, like Cape Honeysuckle, and several of my cycads, also like it here, so I have high hopes.

The most important step was to make sure that there would be water for the new area. I found, to my surprise, a line of spaghetti tubing that had been buried and clogged long ago, so I unclogged it, put a new sprayer head, and set it back down. I also put a new sprayer head on an existing line that was dripping on some ornamental fountain grass, which I have moved. I tossed out some slow release plant food and will use another fresh bag of potting soil to cover the bulbs after they are planted. One thing that old-time gardeners do is a lot of soil preparation! Putting the bulbs in just takes a few minutes. Making sure that they have a comfortable home to live in is the time-consuming part.

The bulbs are on their way to me Priority Mail so I should be seeing them this week!



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