How to Save Tulip Bulbs

Save Potted Tulips for Outdoors

• 1

  Keep watering the plants after they bloom. When the foliage yellows, cut the tulips back to the base of the plant with pruning shears or scissors. You may also be able to just pull up on the foliage to separate it from the bulb.

• 2

  Stop watering the plants and set the pots in a cool, dark location, such as a garage, until the spring.

• 3

  Take the bulbs out of the pots and replant them outdoors about 6 inches deep in a site that receives full sun. Water them well. They will come up the next spring.

Save Potted Tulips for Containers

• 4

  Cut back the foliage to the base of the plant when it yellows. Withhold water and allow the soil to dry out.

• 5

  Remove the bulbs from the soil and place them in an open container in a cool, dark location. Leave them there until two months before you want them to bloom.

• 6

  Place the bulbs in a paper bag surrounded by sphagnum peat moss or moist sand. Place the bag in the crisper of your refrigerator.

• 7

  Replant them in pots when the bulbs begin to sprout.