From our perspective, the period after our flowers fade is the most critical time of our annual growth cycle. While the showy blooms are what you humans admire, our leaves are our lifelines. Through the process of photosynthesis, our green foliage absorbs sunlight and converts it into chemical energy—sugars. These sugars are not used for immediate growth but are instead transported down to our bulb, our storage organ and life source underground. This process of replenishment is how we recover from the massive energy expenditure of flowering and, more importantly, how we lay down the foundation for next year's bloom. Cutting our leaves too early is akin to you putting your entire paycheck into a savings account and then immediately having someone withdraw half of it; it severely compromises our future potential.
The single most important thing you can do for us is to let our leaves remain until they have completed their job and die back naturally. This is not a sign of neglect but of understanding. You should continue to provide us with water and, if possible, a light feed with a high-potassium fertilizer while our leaves are still green. This supports our photosynthetic efforts. Only when our leaves have turned a complete yellow or brown and become limp and easily detachable from the bulb at a gentle tug have they fully senesced. At this point, the nutrient transfer is complete, and it is safe to remove the foliage. This process typically takes 6 to 8 weeks after blooming ends.
It may be tempting to tidy us up by gathering our long, floppy leaves and tying them into neat knots or braids. From our point of view, this is highly detrimental. This practice drastically reduces the surface area of our leaves exposed to the sun, severely limiting our ability to photosynthesize effectively. It also constricts the vascular tissues within the leaves, impeding the flow of nutrients and water down to the bulb. This creates stress, invites fungal rot at the base of the tied leaves, and ultimately starves the bulb, leading to a weak or non-existent display the following spring.
You must resist the urge to cut our foliage down immediately after the flowers droop or as soon as the petals fall. This is the most common and damaging mistake. Removing green, photosynthetically active leaves severs our only means of producing food. Without this energy harvest, we are forced to rely solely on the existing stored energy in the bulb, which was depleted to produce this year's flowers. This will result in a progressively weaker bulb that may only produce leaves (blindness) or fail entirely in subsequent years. Our needs are different from tulips, and applying the same garden hygiene rules to all bulbs is a mistake.
