How to Create an Amazing Spring Flower Garden by Planting Beautiful Bulbs!

Sep 30, 2025

Written by Kelly Miles

How to Create an Amazing Spring Flower Garden by Planting Beautiful Bulbs!

Who doesn't love a garden full of beautiful flowers in spring? Daffodils cheerfully signalling the end of winter, tulips adding colour and sophistication and all those little, special, rare treasures adding interest and depth. What's the catch? You need to plant the bulbs now! Here at The Fruitful Potager we love bulbs and have been experimenting with them for a number of years, so keep reading for all our spring bulb planting tricks and tips.

Using Spring Flower Bulbs in the Garden

There are 3 main looks you can choose from

in groups: bulbs often come in packs of 5 or 10 so popping them in a group makes sense. Groups of uneven numbers look the most natural so 3, 5 or 7 etc work well. One lonely bulb on its own will have no real impact in your garden. You can choose one colour block or mix it up.
in drifts: a large planting of one type of spring flower bulb can really create the wow factor in your garden, whether all in one colour or in combination, complimentary or contrasting
- the possibilities are endless and it's where you can get really creative. To ensure it doesn't end up looking to bitsy, place groups of 3 or 5 of the same colour together with the odd single mixed through. Mixing up the pattern makes it look more natural!
naturalised: this style works particularly well for daffodils and can often be found in old NZ flower gardens or paddocks. To create the look clumps of bulbs are scattered over the area in irregular formations to mimic how nature would do it. Then you wait!
-eventually the bulbs should multiply and fill in the space. Snowflake and crocus flower bulbs are other good options for NZ conditions.

Our Bulb Range

Daffodils

the real harbingers of spring, flowering from late winter right through spring depending on the variety
bulbs usually for sale in NZ include singles, doubles, dwarf, trumpet, split corona and more, with flowers in all shades of yellow, along with whites and oranges, many with the added bonus of a beautiful fragrance
daffodil flower bulbs generally do well in all parts of New Zealand

Spring Flower Bulb NZ Daffodil dwarf Thalia

Tulips

Tulip bulbs flowering in spring really give your garden that wow factor and work in both formal and naturalistic styles of garden
they look great in pots, drifts or just grouped in the garden and are great for picking for the vase
tulip bulbs are no good for the warmer parts of NZ as they need a chilling period, so unless you're committed enough to give them ice baths a few times over winter they may not be for you
luckily for those down South and in the lower North Island they do love cold winters and hot summers

Spring flowering bulbs NZ, tulip orange, pink, crimson Spring Flowering bulbs, Tulips pink and orange NZ

Growing Collectors Bulbs

Spring Flowering Garden Bulb NZ Crocus PickWick pot

There are some beautiful bulbs out there that are not often for sale from the main NZ suppliers but are well worth the effort to find and grow. With the extra investment in time and cost to source and secure these bulbs it makes sense to take some extra steps to ensure they succeed in your garden.

We highly recommend planting in pots, particularly if they are small bulbs

they are much harder to lose; in pots you know exactly where they are (if not exactly what they are, depending on your labelling skills)
they are much easier to label; in the garden labels invariably get lost
you can bring the pots out when the bulbs are flowering and looking their best and hide them away again when they aren't
it keeps them in one place; bulbs can have a tendency to spread themselves about
you can still include them in your flower garden; just dig the pots into the garden so the rim is just above the soil, this keeps them contained but keeps the garden scape looking natural