Pre-soaking Anemone and Ranunculus Corms
Between jumping in mud puddles with my girls after the winter rain, I find myself attempting to stay in the present and enjoy this season. More often than not, I find myself looking forward to spring. Perhaps this is more common than I realize, or perhaps this is the life of a flower farmer: constantly straddling two seasons and taking care of the tasks today while planning and plotting the crops of the future.
After weeks of pouring over growing notes from last season, gathering my succession sow dates, and, well, just overall crop planning (and trying to squeeze in just one more variety of flowers), it feels incredible to put all that planning into action finally. Graham got the greenhouse up, still the same humble one from before, but now with better shelving- yay! Though, from the amount of trays of seeds already sitting in there, the greenhouse will be busting at the seams in a few weeks! We have outgrown this greenhouse long ago, but typically, that doesn’t become apparent until mid-spring.
Luckily, the flowers I’m chattering about today won’t need the greenhouse: ranunculus and anemones!
I get pretty giddy when it comes time to soak these beauties; it means that we are that much closer to spring. Ranunculus and anemones are some of my most fussy yet easygoing flowers, if that even makes sense.
They demand quite a bit of upfront work to stack the odds in our favor of having a successful crop, but once they get going, they go nuts! Last year, we had a tiny twenty-foot-long by four-foot-wide row of ranunculus. We planted multiple successions to increase our harvest window, and from that one row, we were rewarded with loads of these ahhhhmazing blooms. The ranunculus was the fluffy goodness that landed in Reno Edible, which seems to have linked ranunculus and Sierra Flower Farm as best friends for life (we love it!).
Honestly, the first time I attempted to grow ranunculus, it was on a whim. I snagged some corms (off a clearance shelf), read a couple of websites, and just went with it! That year, I had a small success. The stems were short, and the flower heads were not as fluffy as I had hoped. Still, their beauty captivated me. I knew I had to try again... this time for real!
The following season, I invested in some quality corms from a reputable distributor and got my order in early to snag the best chance at the varieties I wanted.
Being a flower farmer sometimes feels like being in a race, who can be on top of life when it comes time to piece an order together in the throws of the flower growing season. Meaning: who cares how many other things are on your plate come late spring/early summer: get those orders in!
I did that.
It ended up being a game-changer.
Ordering Ranunculus & Anemone Corms
Investing in more expensive corms isn’t like a magic bean where they will just get tossed in some dirt and grow magnificently. What investing in more costly corms did do for me was that it upped the game, which translated into it being time to hustle. We weren’t playing with a bag of $10 corms anymore. This was serious all-star stuff, and I was not about to fail them.
The thing is, growing ranunculus and anemones should be taken seriously from the start. They are luxury flowers that demand a high price in return, and rightfully so. The ranunculus and anemone corms are not cheap (even the “cheap” ones aren’t cheap) and are flowers that cost more to grow. They are a crop that deserves a spot in your high tunnel, or if you are like us, we spend a lot of time fussing over low tunnels for these guys.
If you are looking to get into wedding/event work or selling to florists, you will need quality blooms.
The beginning point in getting quality blooms at harvest is investing in quality corms.
Ordering Ranunculus & Anemone Corms from a Reputable Wholesaler Pros
Higher quality corms = higher quality blooms (and more giant flower heads!).
Interesting varieties that will only be available through select wholesalers.
It costs less than buying from a retail seller.
You can start building a positive relationship with your wholesale rep, who is, trust me, beyond knowledgeable.
Less disease.
The freshly purchased corms are easier to work with (than saved ones!).
Overall, it is a great product from a reputable wholesaler.
When Do You Order Ranunculus & Anemone Corms?
This part can get a little confusing, especially if you’ve been trained by the retail sellers.
You will be ordering corms in the spring, typically by June. Sure, you can order later, but you may be limited in choices by then, so if there’s a trendy color or variety you want to snag, the early bird gets the worm.
Don’t worry: Typically, when working with wholesalers, you don’t pay for the product until it is shipped. Corms will typically arrive at your doorstep in late September or early October.
When to Soak Corms
The answer you seek for when to soak your ranunculus and anemone corms depends on your growing climate and operation.
Typically, in zones 8 and higher, you can fall plant these guys and have blooms throughout the winter. In colder hardiness zones 7 and below, you can do this as well… but some season extension methods will need to be implemented, such as using a high tunnel, low tunnels, micro tunnels, or double low tunnels.
If you are in a warmer hardiness zone or have some infrastructure to protect the corms from freezing, you can soak your first succession in fall and plant them out before they get too cold. Ideally, soak them when they arrive and plant them out after pre-sprouting. In late winter/early spring, you can do some follow-up successions. For us, we soak the first winter succession of corms in January; they get planted out in February.
We follow up with another succession of ranunculus and anemones about four weeks after soaking the first round. We aim for two successions, ensuring enough time for a good harvest before the summer heat and increased daylight hours come in mid-June. Typically, it takes 90 days from soaking to get flowers. The time frame may be longer if temperatures are more relaxed.
The plants give their prime blooms for three weeks at a time, so we like to have multiple plantings. Pushing one succession of the crop will lead to smaller flower heads, more pests and disease.
Ranunculus and anemones do not like frozen feet, and they also don’t like wet feet. To better determine when to start crops and plant out, read our blog, Nitty Gritty: Demystifying when to seed start for the flower farmer.
Let’s get into the nitty gritty of successfully growing ranunculus and anemones!
Trust me, their beauty and prolific stem output are worth the trouble-it’sn’t that bad. It’s a unique experience that you could even involve the kids in; mine took a nap on the lawn, so I let my husband help me out with them (more on this later).
When those utterly expensive corms arrive, even those clearance shelf ones, they are ugly and alien-looking. The ranunculus corms have the characteristic of dried-up calamari, and the anemones could easily be mistaken for some shriveled-up animal dropping. Yeah, it's not super attractive. They need to be dry for storage; it keeps them from rotting and keeps themoose when you want them to bloom, dormant (you ch plus it mimics their natural life cycle in the wild- everything needs some rest here and there!). We break this dormancy (wake them up) by soaking them in water (plump them up).
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Now back to the blog!
Let’s wake ‘em up by pumping ‘em up!
This step is seemingly simple but can make or break the success of this crop! Let’s go a little more into detail on this:
Necessary Equipment for Pre-soaking Ranunculus & Anemone Corms
There is some essential equipment needed for pre-soaking ranunculus and anemone corms:
Quality Ranunculus & Anemone Corms
We chatted a little about this. Healthy, bigger corms will yield healthier plants, which means more lush blooms!
Mesh Bags with a Drawstring
You can even snag some from a craft store or Amazon or use the ones in which some tulips or the corms came. I made mine because I had some fabric leftover from making princess dresses hogging up storage space.
Plant tags, with variety and date written in PENCIL
Okay, the pen wears off or rubs off. The pencil will stay for life; use a pencil or risk playing the guessing game later!
Bucket
Make sure it’s clean, sanitized, and large enough to hold corms when they double in size! We use a 5-gallon bucket.
Water
Room temperature is preferable; cold is okay, too, just not hot.
Before soaking the corms, make your labels and place your corms in mesh bags. I like to stay organized when I can, keeping individual varieties in their own bags.
Name of the pre-soaking ranunculus and anemone game
We are playing a balancing act, and the game's name is to prevent mushy, rotting corms and promote healthy root growth. The balancing act attempts to control the growth of harmful bacteria and fungi while enabling the friendly ones. Anaerobic bacteria and fungi are typically not our friends; they proliferate and wreak havoc, such as root rot. Ranunculus and anemones are highly susceptible to root rot, which is one of the biggest growing challenges.
There are three major players in this game: water, time, and the chosen method of pre-soaking.
1: Temperature of Water for Soaking the Corms
As mentioned, the water needs to be room temperature, or a little cooler is fine. Nothing warm to the touch or hot is acceptable. Bacteria and fungi like to grow in warmth, and we don’t need to be trying to cook up our little corm nuggets!
2: Amount of Time to Soak the Corms for
The corms do not need long to rehydrate; therefore, they don't need to sit in water for hours or days. Letting them sit in the water for too long can be devastating and lead to more rot. Not letting them soak long enough may also not benefit them from the pre-soaking process required to wake them up. Three to four hours is optimal.
3: Chosen Method of Pre-soaking Corms
Anaerobic bacteria and fungi thrive in environments lacking oxygen. Therefore, we need to make the environment inhospitable by adding more oxygen to suppress their growth and thus enhance healthy root growth! This is a very similar concept we chatted about in our Nitty Gritty on Compost II post a while back.
To further combat fungi and unfriendly bacteria, you can add a fungicide in the last thirty minutes or soak the corms.
Throwing your quality corms in a clean bucket with room temperature water for 3-4 hours is still not enough. You can still see more rot than necessary!
Two ways are commonly used to add additional oxygen to the soaking corms’ water:
Pre-Soaking Ranunculus & Anemone Corms Methods
Method 1 of Pre-Soaking Corms: Running Tap Water
You can have your corms soaking in a bucket that’s sitting under a spigot (kitchen, bathroom in an area in a comfy room temperature, so maybe not outside on a winter eve) on a slight trickle. This method slowly flushes out the older water and introduces fresh water, thus, fresh oxygen. I hear my family in California screaming at me at the thought of allowing water to run for 3-4 hours!
Yes, this approach is a bit wasteful, which is one reason we do not use it.
The second disadvantage of soaking corms in running tap water is that it does not oxygenate the water as much as our second method.
Method 2 of Pre-Soaking Corms: Pump oxygen into the water
Please put down your straw and back away. Do not blow air into the water for hours.
I'm totally kidding, but in case you thought that (like my four-year-old daughter), invest in a cheap aquarium pump instead.
We paid about $15 and snagged one off of Amazon because who really wants to trudge through the snow to the store? Not me! With a 5-gallon bucket and a lid, Graham took the basic concept and did his Graham thing to it (which you can learn how to make here).
While the corms are soaking, go to the movies, picnic, or sanitize some seedling trays- do what you must! Hopefully, it's just not laundry because that’s boring.
After those few hours, when you pull your corms from the water, they should be nice, plump, and doubled in size!
Below, you can watch us pre-soaking corms and how we made our pre-soaking corm system!
The Ranunculus & Anemone corms have been soaked; Now What?
Once you have soaked your ranunculus and anemone corms, you have to choose your own adventure game:
You can plant the corms directly into prepared beds or
You can pre-sprout the corms
What the heck is “pre-sprouting”?!
In our PRE-SPROUTING RANUNCULUS & ANEMONE CORMS blog, you can learn about pre-sprouting corms, why you should consider it, and how.
I hope you found this post helpful in your growing ranunculus and anemone flower venture!
We are looking forward to helping you hand blooms soon!
Jessica & Graham
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