Amaryllis is good for dramatic winter blooms

At one point, they numbered 12 million people. At the time, the city of London had 35,000 people. The Inca Empire stretched from modern day Cusco, Peru, north to Colombia and south over much of today’s Argentina and Chile. But at the heart of their empire there grows a plant with strapping leaves and bold trumpet flowers. Fittingly one of the newest flowers is from this region, the Amaryllis Peruvian Design (Hippeastrum hybrid).

This huge bulb is grown in the Inca Valley of the Andes Mountains. Plant it now and it will be sending up cherry-red blossoms highlighted by stunning star-shaped white markings in the throat. Each flower stalk blooms with four or even five trumpet flowers.

The name “Hippeastrum” gets part of its name from a horse in an around about way. Hippeastrum means “knight’s star,” or more properly, the horseman’s star from hippeus, meaning a horseman.

Call them what you may, any Amaryllis is good for winter bloom, right when we need a horseman to rescue us from the dreary winter.

Many amaryllis arrive potted, and only need watering and sunlight to burst into bloom. Unlike daffodil or tulip bulbs, Amaryllis bulbs do not need pre-cooling to bloom indoors forced.

Keep your bulbs in a cool, dry place with good air circulation when you plant them. Select a pot about half-again as wide as the bulb so the bulb will become a little root bound.

Leave less than two inches between the bulb and the side of the pot. Most bulbs should fit in a six- to eight-inch diameter pot. Be sure the pot has a drainage hole.

Plant the bulb using sterile potting soil. These bulbs do best only partially buried, so pot each bulb so that the top third of the bulb and its neck are above the soil. This keeps any water from going down into the neck of the bulb, causing it to rot. There is no need to add fertilizer at this point.

Water your newly potted bulb just once. Water from the bottom up until the soil is totally soaked. Now don’t water again until the soil is completely dry.

This is when the bulb begins to grow roots to bring moisture into the bulb, and if you water too much it will rot the bulb.

Once the long, strapping flat leaves appear and the flower stem pokes out you can water about once a week or when the top inch of soil feels dry.

Often the heavy blooms cause the stem to get top heavy and bend or even break. Tie the stems to a sturdy stick to hold up the stem. The flowers start out green and tightly folded, coloring up quickly before the petals open.

Each flower stem produces four or five blooms, opening within two or three days of each other. Larger bulbs can produce several flower stems at once.

To prolong the life of the flowers, keep the plant in a cool room out of direct sunlight. Carefully cut off each flower as it fades so your plant does not waste energy forming seeds.

After the last blooms are gone, cut off the main stem two inches above the bulb. Surprisingly, the main stem is hollow but stayed rigid thanks to the water in its tissues. Move the plant back into full light, careful not to sunburn it. Fertilize your bulb every two to three weeks.

In the fall the amaryllis needs to go dormant. Cut back watering the bulb by going longer between waterings until you stop watering completely. Trim off any brown leaves so they don’t draw nutrition from the bulb. About six to eight weeks before you want blooms, you can start the forcing process once again. Without removing the bulb from its pot take out the top half inch of soil from the pot, and replace it with new potting soil. Water the potted Amaryllis bulb from the bottom up and repeat the cycle once again.

Whether you pot up the newest Inca Amaryllis, or an old favorite, the blooms will brighten the short days of winter, perhaps much as the Inca worshiped Inti, the sun god.