Bulbfields in the Netherlands

[Maggi Young]

I apologise if you have already told us this, Luit, but I cannot recall..... how many bulbs would you estimate there to be in one of these colour sections in these stunning field (either by number or weight)?

[mark smyth]

wow! Yes more Crocus, please

[Lvandelft]

I apologise if you have already told us this, Luit, but I cannot recall..... how many bulbs would you estimate there to be in one of these colour sections in these stunning field (either by number or weight)?

Maggi, it's just a bit of a guess, but when the blue field is 2 hectares then they might have planted 1.5 millions of bulbs there.
Any more knowledgeable Dutch grower who read this, is most welcome to correct me. I never grew Crocus on a larger scale.
But I have some old reference books. Things might have changed by modern culture methods?

[Maggi Young]

Thank you , Luit.... my goodness.... that is a huge number of bulbs....
those girls are really kept busy, aren't they?

[Lvandelft]

Doing what...... baking crocus tart...?       

[Maggi Young]

Doing what...... baking crocus tart...?       

Of course... is that not what all those bulbs are used for? 

[Lvandelft]

The fields here around the house are slowly showing some color, but yesterday morning I looked out of the window and saw more than 10 people picking narcissi 

Narcissus field

[Maggi Young]

Luit, these people are STEALING the narcissi?   Just the flowers or the bulbs also?

[Lvandelft]

Luit, these people are STEALING the narcissi?   Just the flowers or the bulbs also?

Maggi, please not such bad thoughts of the people over-here 

But the answer is no, because of coming Easter weekend my neighbor hopes to make some money for his flowers, so he hired a lot of foreign people to pick the flowers.
When you have a closer look at the more right side you see the picked bunches in the path.

[Maggi Young]

Oh, thank goodness for that... though I did think it odd that thieves would wear bright yellow jackets!  Not many flowers out in that field though, the one behind is better... have they picked all those  now too?

[Lvandelft]

Maggi, in Holland are almost 1600 Ha Narcissus grown this year. Not all are suited as cutflower. For your information, on my neighbor field are growing the double flowering Dick Wilden. Of this variety there are this year about 24 Ha.

[Armin]

Hi Luit,
nice to see the bulbfields near your home again. My first thought was workers picking virused narcissus
Your professional neighbour is practising crop exchange.
Last year it was a nice pink of tulips now it will be yellow of narcissus.
What an annual nice change 

[Lvandelft]

Last year it was a nice pink of tulips now it will be yellow of narcissus.

Today the whole brigade of people were back for picking flowers.
If they come once again there will be not much yellow left Armin

[Armin]

Luit,
I think that's "business before pleasure" 

[Lvandelft]

An Eco-friendly way to keep the bulb fields healthy is to inundate. One of my neighbors has flooded one of his fields. I made this week some pictures from behind our house and you see a lot of geese. No problem you think, but in the meantime there are already more than 100 and they are very noisy, by day AND by night
And they get company of a  flock of little sterns, which make almost as much noise as the geese

On the first picture (left in front) are some young geese of a family living in our canal and interestingly they don’t mix up with the whole flock.