But first, it became Winter… Reading When The Sun Shines 7 minutes Next Blue Monday

When The Sun Shines

I don’t know about your corner of the world, but in our idyllic village, Burgervlotbrug, we haven’t seen the sun in weeks, maybe even months. Our coastal town has been grey and dark, the rough waves have spent months making mindful beach walks impossible, and it’s just been, well, cold. 

And then suddenly she made an appearance: our beloved sun. The thing about coastal towns is that they seem to transform into a completely different location once the sun breaks through the clouds. The grey filter everything seems to have, which makes the sky and the buildings all the same colour, falls away and many people, including myself, are instantly happier. 

“Als de zon er niet was geweest, was er nooit een reden voor een feest” Is a line from a Dutch song by Andre van Duin, which translates into “If we didn’t have the sun, we would never have a reason for celebration,” and I really like those words. Amaryllis Bogota 

Many Amaryllises also appear much more beautiful once you see them in natural sunlight. The sun makes their colour sparke, and when I take photographs, they come out a hundred times better. This news blog will be about Amaryllises, if you hadn’t guessed that yet… I have spent the past week doing little else than dabbling around in my greenhouse, making sure all Amaryllises are the right variety, and checking that they are doing well: I can use all of that information to give every variety we offer a description that really tells you something about that specific flower, because every single one of them has unique qualities that can help you choose which one is your perfect match.

Did I not leave my house at all then, you may ask, but I did! And then I went over to an Amaryllis grower to look at their collection. This week, I went to Park Amaryllis in Limmen.  Park Amaryllis creating new varieties in one of their greenhouses 

Something interesting to tell you is that Park Amaryllis focuses on perfecting Amaryllises that are able to be grown out in the field. By far, most Amaryllises come from greenhouses, but this development of growing them outside is extremely compelling to us, and Vlad and I have been following the progress of this process very closely over the past couple of years.Last summer, we also visited Park to look at their fields. We were too late for the flowers, but that did not matter: We came to see how the plant behaved after they had finished growing their flowers. This is their trial field. Here, they select the varieties that perform best, and those are selected to be used for hybridising further varieties. Then in this greenhouse, more testing occurs. You may wonder, after all this industry talk, how this affects you as the customer. I personally think that this is very interesting for our customers, because these field Amaryllises can also be used to grow in your own living room during the winter months. Amaryllis Table Dance

The difference there is that it would be easy for people who choose these varieties to get their Amaryllis bulb to come back for several years. You keep the Amaryllis in the house after she has bloomed during the winter months, and when the freezing temperatures are gone, you take the bulb and plant it in your garden (or, when your pot is large enough, you put the whole pot outside). As these Amaryllises are better equipped to grow during the cold, you’’ll see that at the end of summer, you have a bulb that has grown back into strong shape, and it is ready to go back into the house for the winter months. 

And besides this, it could also very well be that the cost of these field Amaryllises is lower, as it is less expensive to grow bulbs outside than in a greenhouse. Amaryllis White Nile 

Secretly, without telling you, we already have a few of these varieties in our assortment right now. Examples of these are Red Tiger, Vulcano, and White Nile. If you’ve purchased one of those varieties, or are planning to–these three are still in stock!--you can plant them in the garden when spring arrives. Cleopatra is another one of them, but she has already sold out. Amaryllis Ocean Drive

Another thing this Amaryllis can be used for now is to treat her like a regular garden plant, like a Dahlia, Begonia, or Zantedeschia. We currently have four varieties that are up for this treatment: Arabian Night, Ocean Drive, River Dance, and Table Dance. These four varieties can be planted at the same time as the Dahlia, and you can order them now: they will arrive together with the Dahlias if you ordered those as well. You can plant both of those at the end of April-the beginning of May. You’ll see that they grow and bloom in your garden. The growing part is especially interesting about this. The bulbs are strong and healthy, and when autumn arrives, you’ll see that the bulbs have grown a great deal. You can keep these bulbs and put them in your house again, where they will flower during winter. Another option is to keep them with your Dahlias or other summer-blooming flower bulbs and store them at a cool place where there is no frost at all. Then, you can plant all those bulbs again in the spring. Amaryllis Vulcano 

Sometimes, when the frost isn’t too bad, Amaryllises can survive the winter outside in the garden. But personally, I would not take that risk. If the temperature goes down too much, I’m afraid the flowers won’t be returning. 

Now… the sun is shining, the sky is blue, I want to go back outside to play in my greenhouse again. Paeonia Festiva Maxima 

Another message from Vlad, before I forget: The Peony Offer is still going. When you buy one, you receive two. The quality is still exactly where we want it to be: Nice, large buds packed in a bit of soil. 

To tell you another little secret, I’ll whisper so Vlad doesn’t hear: If you purchase Peony Sarah Bernhardt, Blaze, Duchesse de Nemours, Festiva Maxima, Miss Americana or Top Hat, which all have three of them per package, you’ll get three extra, too. A great Peony deal to start off the year 2025.I’ll go back to my hobby now: Judging Amaryllises with Vlad

Kind regards, and until next week!

Carlos van der Veek