As the holiday season approaches, put paperwhites on your list to bring floral cheer and decoration into your home. They are easiest of all the bulbs to force into bloom. Paperwhites are quick to grow, fragrant and beautiful.
Bulbs are available wherever spring bulbs are sold and are often still for sale late into the season making these a great choice for Christmas planting. “Ziva” is an early bloomer and is readily available. Another selection has pale yellow blooms. Paperwhites are native to the Mediterranean region and belong to the larger Narcissus group that includes daffodils and jonquils.
These are not hardy plants but they lend themselves for indoor forcing. Stems will produce 4 to 8 flowers that in most cases are star-shaped, white and very fragrant. Paperwhites are easy to grow and don’t require any special treatment or cold period conditioning. You don’t even need any soil. Simply place bulbs root side down into a shallow glass or ceramic bowl without a drainage hole. Use glass marbles or pebbles to anchor the bulbs. This medium will also provide support and space for the roots to grow.
Fill the bowl to just below the bottom of the bulbs with water. Be careful, bulbs will rot if sitting on water! Set aside and watch for roots to develop and green tips to emerge. You may also consider using a soilless potting mix and plant your paperwhites in a bulb pan or regular six-inch nursery pot. I much prefer this method and consider it the best and easiest. Simply place bulbs with the wide end down in the soil with approximately the top centimeter of the bulb above the soil line.
When purchasing bulbs, I always, when possible, purchase the top size. These will give you the best display of bloom. For a six inch pot, use an odd number of bulbs and depending on the bulb size, use five to seven, planting them closely together almost touching each other. Water the soil thoroughly.
Place your pots and/or ceramic bowls in bright light to encourage growth. Some sources suggest a cool and indirect light period for a few days but I have found that this is not necessary. Roots will quickly appear. In the pots, they will peak through the drainage holes at the bottom. Buds and eventual bloom will appear quickly, often in a few weeks (three to four) and even sooner if planted closer to Christmas.
As easy as paperwhites are to grow, a downfall is their rapid growth, which often leads to tall and leggy plants that may require staking and support. An easy fix is to use decorative branches from the garden such as colourful dogwood inserted into the soil and tied with festive ribbon. The Flowerbulb Research Program at Cornell University in the United States, however, has had great success with “pickling” paperwhites to control the growth of stems and leaves.
Solutions of diluted alcohol are used to control the growth resulting in a plant that is about one third shorter in size. I have never tried this but who knows? There appears to be good success in this growing method. The alcohol solution is made of water with four to six percent alcohol using any hard liquor such as whiskey or vodka. Cornell suggests to get a five percent solution from a forty percent distilled spirit; add one part alcohol to seven parts water. Rubbing alcohol is also a suitable replacement. Again, they suggest a dilution of one part rubbing alcohol to ten or eleven parts water. Replace the water in your ceramic bowl of bulbs after one week when growth has started with the pickling solution. Continue to use this solution when watering. I would suggest that this solution is also suitable to use in potted paperwhites.
The theory behind this successful growing method is that the alcohol makes it difficult for the plant to absorb the normal amounts of water, suffering from then a lack of water, which results in stunted growth. This does not affect flower size or length of bloom.
Plant paperwhites at intervals of two to four weeks. Extra bulbs can be stored after purchase at room temperature in a dark place with good air circulation. This will provide continuous bloom well past Christmas and into the dismal months of January and February. Discard bulbs when the bloom is finished.
So… looking for fast and easy? Here they are! Source out some paperwhites and try your hand at forcing bulbs for holiday use and beyond. You will be surprised at the instant results.
— By Robert Newman, Guelph-Wellington Master Gardeners