Inoculating bulbs?

penstemon penstemon@Q.com
Thu, 04 Feb 2016 17:28:56 PST
>To me, it seems entirely reasonable to assume that many wild bulb populations have some sort of positive relationship to the microfauna in the soil they share. Keeping with this line of reasoning, I wonder if some of the "difficult" bulbous species out there, unknown in cultivation, may only need the correct fungal association (or bacterial, or whatever) to survive in cultivation? Or could using beneficial bacteria/fungi to inoculate our current bulbs improve their vigor, or other unforeseen benefits?


Probably. One would also probably need to use the correct species of mycorrhiza. 
Fertilizing with phosphorus would require considerable care, as the acceptable “window” is very small, if not infinitesimal. Fungicides are of course fatal to mycorrhizae. 

I’ve never noticed any difference in non-bulbous plants grown in mycorrhizae-inoculated soil-less mixes and those grown in regular soil-less mixes, but then, I might not be very observant. 

Bob Nold,
Denver, Colorado, USA
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