When to plant amaryllis bulbs

Question

We just dug up some amaryllis bulbs because we did not like the location and besides they had already flowered. My wife says we should let the bulbs dry and plant them next spring. I was under the impression they will die if we dont plant them quickly.

Help.

Answer 1

Your wife is correct.  The bulbs will store just fine over the winter.

Keep them in a cool dry place and, if you want, you can place them in a bit of peat moss.  You can place the peat in something like a shoe box and just set the bulbs in it.  It's not necessary, though.

Answer 2

Here in Z4 N Dakota I keep mine watered after Christmas and plant pot and all in spring. After the first frost I dig them up and store them pot and all in a dry room in my basement. About six or seven weeks before Christmas I repot them in fresh soil and start watering. I give a bunch away at Christmas or I wouldn't have room for a tree LOL. They don't really know a season based on daylight hours like Poinsettia's, only wet and dry. You can get them to bloom on the 4th of July if you start in June, I've done it with red and white ones and now I see pale blue ones for sale.  RScott

Answer 3

Commercially, they are dug up after flowering and dried out so they can be sold.  The conditions they keep them in would be difficult to replicate at home, so I'd replant them quickly.  If they have been out of the ground for more than an hour or so, your choices are limited.

If you brush off the soil and put the bulbs in a brown paper bag and leave them in your veggie bin in the fridge, they might make it til spring, but I'd take them out at Christmas and plant them in pots.  You can transplant them into the garden once it warms up.

If you wait until spring they won't have time to make roots before the top growth starts.