Scilla hughii experiment in propagation from bulbils

First bought on a visit to Broadleigh Gardens in 2024, the bulb having been moved a couple of times, flowered very well in the front garden this year.

I wanted to move it back to somewhere in the back garden where I spend most of my time, so decided to dig it up and provisionally plant it in a ceramic plant pot until all the snowdrops are up, and I can situate it reasonable well. It had shown no sign of making offsets or having naturally divided as my Scilla Peruviana have done.

Having lifted the bulb in early May, after flowering, whilst the leaves were still green, but definitely showing signs of moving towards the end of the season, I saw clustered amongst and still attached a number of these small bulbils,( is that the name for these, other suggestions would be appreciated)  and not at all similar to the formation by division on S. Peruviana. With no information that I could find on line, I decided to remove three of these little bulbils but leave the remaining ones there.

The main bulb was replanted into a ceramic pot similar to the one I grew it in the first year, and planted the small bulbils into a much smaller terracotta pot in similar gritty soil.  All summer during the hot dry conditions I wondered if the three small bulbils had survived.  The pot had been placed where it got the morning sun but was spared the temperatures and heating effect of the strong afternoon sun these past few weeks. It will be interesting to follow the growth of the little bulbils and measure the time to first flowering. 

Small greening bulbils of Scilla hughii

Being curious today, I checked the pot and the bulbils appeared to have grown a little in size, taken on a more more resilient looking outer having turned green with small roots of their own.  Further investigation of the large bulb this week showed new roots just starting to be formed but no sign of the several other bulbils I had left behind.  I am unsure whether they have just rotted away or just decayed.  The bulb was repotted as carefully as possible, and the tips of the new growth are just emerging and it appears that there may be two crowns, so the bulb may divide itself next year. The advice is to grow the bulb with its shoulder above the soil. 

August 2026 new growth emerging from repotted Scilla Hughii