Tulip Thoughts

Froggy asked me what I meant by baby oil in connection with the tulips. We have moles & voles & gophers. (Actually, that makes a good song when sung to the tune of Mairsey Doats). Moles and voles like to eat plant roots & bulbs, gophers like to eat the grubs that are attracted by plant roots & bulbs. But none of them like mineral oil or dish soap. Mineral oil is sold plain, but it's pricy. However, baby oil is basically mineral oil with scent added and it's much cheaper. So I use baby oil, I fill up my watering can with water then add about 1/2 a bottle of baby oil and liquid dish soap. I'm not sure how much soap, several squirts from my soap pump. You'll want to put the soap in AFTER the water & baby oil, otherwise it will bubble up. Stir it up and pour it over the dirt. Really soak the dirt. Then about a week or two later it gets another treatment. The scent of the baby oil makes it smell nice! Then the moles & voles & gophers leave because of the mineral oil and the grubs leave because of the soap.

The first year we planted tulips, we discovered that most of the bulbs had been eaten or disturbed by grub eaters when they didn't come up the next spring. That's when I discovered this liquid remedy. It can also be used after the bulbs are planted, but it works best if it's done before the bulbs are in.

The second year was not a good year for tulips, but that was because the dogs ran across the tulip bed and destroyed most of the plants just before they bloomed. But they had come up and were healthy otherwise. That's when the tulip bed moved to the front! The dirt will hold quite a bit of the oil residue, so when I plant the bulbs the dirt will pretty much hold the shape of the shovel or bulb planter but that actually makes it easier to plant. I turned the dirt over with a shovel yesterday after weeding, I will probably get the first treatment on it in the next few days. I thought I had baby oil left from last year but I don't. So I'll get it tomorrow or the next day, but we still have plenty of time before we need to plant because the ground is still way too warm.