Hadeco’s Tulip Range: What to Buy and How to Care for these Colourful Cup-Shaped Blooms

If you’re looking to add a little colour into your home, you can look no further than Hadeco’s vast and beautiful tulip bulb range. Often misunderstood to be difficult to grow, tulips are a magnificent natural addition to complete your living space.

Explore a range of bulbs and gardening accessories – all available at Hadeco – and discover all there is to know about tulip care.

Pick out your bulbs

For R230 a bag, you could purchase a bag of 10 or 12 cold-treated bulbs. At Hadeco you have the choice of the following tulip types:

Columbus (Peony tulip) – a large peony tulip that brings gradients of pink to the garden
Rococo (parrot) – comes to bloom with red feathered petals
Strong Gold – brings warm yellow blooms to your garden
Antarctica – perfect for gardeners looking for a sea of white in their garden
Ile de France – brings long-lasting, bright red blooms
Purple Prince – offers pretty purple petals
Esta Bonita – brings a sea of rich red-orange petals (the orange outlining the mostly red flower)
Double Princess – develops as beautiful double pink flowers
Leen van de Mark – appears as red blooms adorned with white bands around the edges
Super Parrot – blooms as oversized, pure white ruffled tulips
Abba – peony-like plant with richly coloured red feathery blooms surrounding a yellow centre
Curry – offers large and richly coloured reddish-pink blooms
Charmeur – appears mostly pink with white bands lining the edges
Denmark – brings beautiful orange blooms with golden yellow margins
Delta Graffiti – offers large and richly coloured deep cherry-pink blooms
Classic Red & White Mix – combines bold red and crisp white tulips for a timeless, elegant spring display in beds, borders and pots
Orange Princess (Peony tulip) – offers vibrant orange double blooms

How to plant and care for your tulips

Once you’ve chosen your bulbs, you’ll want to know exactly how they should be planted and what regular maintenance you’d need to do to ensure that they stay alive and healthy.

All about cold-treated tulips

The Hadeco range features cold-treated tulips, which refers to tulips that are pre-chilled in a freezer to mimic a cold winter. Tulips take well to cold winters and mild springs, so in a warmer climate area like South Africa, cold-treated tulips are considered better to provide an optimal bloom; though non-cold-treated tulips could very well survive under the right conditions (in a spot with morning sun and afternoon shade).

Once planted, the cold-treated bulbs can take about six to eight weeks to bloom based on the length of their cold treatment.

When and where to plant your tulips

It is best to plant your cold-treated tulip bulbs during the month of July and within five days of receiving them to achieve optimal bloom results. Cold-treated tulips thrive in either sunlight or semi-shaded areas and bulbs should be planted in well-draining soil with the pointy end facing upwards; any other way won’t work.

If you’re planting in your garden, space your bulbs about 8 cm apart, cover with 2 cm of soil, then add a 2 cm layer of compost on top. When planting in a container, the bulbs can be placed closer together.

Tulip care tips

In garden beds: Water every three-to-four days for 10 minutes, provided it hasn’t rained.
In pots: Water every two-to-three days until water runs freely from the drainage holes. If using a saucer, empty it after 30 minutes.

Deep watering is imperative. Note that after flowering, bulbs can be discarded, as South Africa’s warmer springtime prevents them from producing daughter bulbs for next year.

Find more pro-tips here.

Need to know

Once you’re ready to get planting, you can purchase your own pack of bulbs via Takealot at R250 while stocks last. There you’ll also find cute flowerpots and other gardening accessories.