October 11, 2026

Pictured: Vanguard crocus (1934); regal lily (1905); Gypsy Queen hyacinth (1927); Coleur Cardinal tulip (1845); Kinglet daffodil (1959); Mariette tulip (1942)

        Our 2026 Fall shipping season began as September ended! As usual for fall bulbs, we’ll begin with orders going to the coldest zones and with the orders placed earliest, noting any requests to avoid particular dates due to travel or other concerns. If we have your order now, you can expect it to arrive by Halloween (unless you asked us to send it in early November). We’ll send an email with tracking information when the order leaves here, letting you know if it’s going through US mail or UPS, and giving you a sense of what date to expect their delivery.

        While waiting for your box to arrive, don’t be too concerned about impending frost or scattered snow flurries! Here in zone 6a we have had some beautiful, warm fall days, but we typically have a hard frost in late October. The ground does not freeze as quickly as our leafy plants, so there is still time to plant bulbs. We are often still out planting bulbs after Thanksgiving because the bulbs do just as well as ones planted earlier.

If you’re particularly worried, you can pre-dig the ground and then cover it with mulch to further postpone its freezing; just remember to remove the mulch in early spring so that the warm sunlight can reach the soil directly.

The tulips you ordered can be the last bulbs you plant this season. Tulips prefer cool soil, with the ideal planting temperature between 40ºF and 55ºF at a depth of 6 inches and generally below 60ºF. Cool soil encourages strong root development while reducing the risk of fungal growth and bulb rot. It also discourages premature growth, giving the bulbs time to settle in and rest before their spectacular spring debut.

Tulips are remarkably easy to grow, whether in garden borders or in containers. With 15 official division classifications, they come in an extraordinary variety of colors, shapes, and bloom times—and few things announce the arrival of spring more beautifully.

It’s no wonder that tulips caused such a sensation during “Tulipmania” in Holland in the 1630s. Certain bulbs commanded extraordinarily high prices - up to 10 times an average salary for one bulb! Tulips are still wildly popular today, and you’ll find a wonderful variety of heirloom tulips on our site, including some varieties that date back as far as 1595. The good news? Our prices are considerably more reasonable! Check our site to read the tulip stories, see the pictures, and order some treasures for your garden.

Our two oldest tulips:

You may have noticed a code in our daffodil descriptions and wondered what it means. It’s easier than it looks! The American Daffodil Society and Royal  Horticultural Society use a simple code to provide shorthand descriptions of daffodils.