White amaryllis in bloom at the Palmer Pioneer Home December 25, 2023.
Amaryllis bulb in Gary McMichael's room at the Palmer Pioneer home on Christmas Day 2023.
Last December, I read a humorous story about amaryllis bulbs in the weekly email I receive from my favorite gardening magazine, "Green Prints". In the story, confusion about beautiful naked ladies dancing in a back yard resulted in much trouble. However, the naked ladies turned out to be amaryllis plants and the magazine went on to say that the story never happened – it was fiction, but that laughter is good for all of us.
I'd never before heard of amaryllis as "naked ladies" and I've been a gardener for over 50 years. But having grown up in Glennallen, it is not surprising if there are several gardening phrases I might have missed. I wondered if I googled "naked ladies," would amaryllis come up? Immediately realizing that would not be a smart thing to do, I instead googled "amaryllis".
Christmas 2023 turned out to be my Christmas of amaryllis bulbs! It started out with a Home Depot November sale flyer advertising two bulbs for $12. What a deal! The sale was not just for Black Friday, but included days before and after. I was definitely interested and put the flyer in the pile by the door, for my next trip to Wasilla. My husband and I had not watched one of these bulbs grow for several years, and I wanted to purchase two, one for my house and one for his room at the Pioneer Home.
However, I don't drive to Wasilla very often and didn't make it to Home Depot until Dec. 4 and I was very happy to find that they still had some amaryllis bulbs for sale and still had two colors to choose from. They were individually packaged in boxes, along with "condensed" soil and a pot. I carefully peeked into each box to check the condition of the bulbs. (One previous year, I'd come home with a box containing a bulb which sported eight inch long yellow leaves.)
I also shopped for and chose a six-hook coat bar rack for Gary's room. With only three items in my cart, I decided to go through self-checkout. When the total came up much higher than expected, I found that each bulb was ringing up at $16.98. How could that be? They were on sale for two for $12. I had the sale flyer with me and searched the fine print. Sure enough the sale had ended just a few days before, on the last day of November.
I looked around for someone to help me delete the bulbs from my purchase. The store was so busy, five minutes passed before two ladies came to help-a clerk with a trainee. The next 15 minutes were a "comedy" of errors as I was eventually helped by a total of five clerks. Finally, I was able to walk out to my car with my coat hook bar, but was quite disappointed about no bulbs and the waste of time.
Next stop was Lowe's to see what they had in the way of coat hook bars. But first I wanted to check out the amaryllis bulbs. Their bulbs in boxes were even more expensive than Home Depot. But then I found a rather small, nearly empty box of individually netted "Red Lion" bulbs for $6.98 each-something I'd never seen at one of these big box stores. I happily bought only one for Gary's room.
A few weeks later, while pushing fresh snow off my deck, I was surprised to see a package on the ground by the side of the garage door. I wasn't expecting anything and no package had ever been left in that location before. When I saw the return label of a bulb company, I was immediately concerned, since it was only 6 degrees. How long had the package sat there? Whatever was in there would be frozen.
I opened it to indeed find a large bulb covered in some kind of waxy gold material. Relieved, I thought it was a candle. Then I noticed at the top of the wax ball (with metal wire stand) what looked to be the beginnings of live growth and a tag stating it was a "Red Victory" amaryllis bulb! That brought to mind all kinds of questions, like how were the roots going to penetrate the wax to get to the soil, etc. In the meantime, it needed to warm up. The bulb was too cold for me to hold in my hands. I placed it on the kitchen counter. After half an hour I checked on it, only to find it still very cold to the touch. The little bit of growth was limp, translucent and yellow.
That evening, I called my friend in Slana (who had sent this gift) and explained the circumstances. She advised me to keep all the paperwork in case it didn't grow. After about four days, I could tell that it would indeed survive. The little bit of growth had turned pale green and the top of the bulb felt firm. Hooray!
By Dec. 22, my waxed dipped bulb had three inches of green growth, Gary's bulb had 12 inches and the swelling of a bud, and the amaryllis plant at the end of one of the wings at the Pioneer Home was full of beautiful white blossoms. When my daughter called the night of the 23rd, I told her about my fascinating waxed dipped amaryllis bulb. But, that was no surprise to her, because years ago when she worked in the floral department of a Whole Foods store, she sold waxed dipped amaryllis bulbs every Christmas.
About that Google search for amaryllis, I found lots of companies that advertised bulbs 50% off, so close to Christmas. I got on a few websites about how to grow amaryllis, but none mentioned naked ladies. I tried a different search-"other names for amaryllis". Wikipedia came up and in it I read: The common name "naked lady" comes from the plant's pattern of flowering when the foliage has died down. This name is also used for other bulbs with a similar growth pattern. Finally, the answer I'd been searching for.
The "Red Victory" bulb from my Slana neighbor was beautiful, but turned out to be white. For about two months, Gary and I both enjoyed watching the "naked ladies" grow and bloom in all their red and white beauty.
