I’m in Zone 4 and have a few dozen daffodils in an irrigated flower bed. This year they only produced 3 blossoms. What do I do now- dig them up and plant new ones? Put some kind of fertilizer down? Give up on having daffodils?- I have the same problem with tulips in that the ones I plant bloom a couple of years and then stop, while the ones that came with the house lasted decades before finally dying off.
I have ones from last year that started blooming two weeks ago. The one I planted in mid April haven’t poked up so I dug one up and checked on. It’s starting to work it’s way up. Been a really cold spring up here until today. 82 degrees today in Michigan, yea! 
Zone 4?
I don’t know about your daffodils, but tulips vary wildly in their ability to come back year after year. Look for tulips labelled “good for naturalizing”. I always liked the Darwin hybrids. When you plant them, put down some bone meal.
Also, both daffodils and tulips require full sun. This may not inhibit the first year bloom, but if they are in a shady spot, they may not get enough energy to come back.
I assume the hardiness zone. Zone 4 is about the middle of daffodils’ range.
Is there a big difference in the quality of tulip bulbs for sale? I thought a bulb was a bulb, but FWIW the ones that my mother bought from Breck’s lasted 20 years, and the ones I bought from Walmart about 5. Both the tulips and daffodils were bags of random assortments, so I’m wondering if they threw whatever they had left over in there after they sold the “good ones” to regular garden stores. A batch of red and yellow tulips from about 20 years ago are also still going, these do get a lot of sun and no water in the summer, based on pictures these look to be red and yellow emperor tulips.
I’m asking now because if I’m going to need to dig up the daffodils and start over I want to do it before the foliage dies back so I can see where they’re at.
You probably already know this but in case you don’t…once the flowers have finished blooming on daffodils, do NOT cut off the stems. As they die back naturally–from top to bottom–the energy drains back down into the bulb and you have a much better chance of it coming back next year.
I don’t know if this is true in your case, but squirrels can be a terrible nuisance to bulbs; they love those tasty little spuds.
One autumn I planted hundreds of crocus bulbs under my lawn (it wasn’t that much work) and he following spring, I had all those pretty little flowers peeking up over the snow in my front yard. But within a few years, they were all gone, eaten by those nasty little squirrel varmints. It’s a good thing I don’t have shot-gun because I’d clear them all out if I could.
I’ve never heard of squirrels eating daffodil bulbs - they’re pretty toxic (unlike crocus corms).
It might also be the whacky weather this year.
About half my daffodils and tulips bloomed this year - coincidentally, those in the most protected corner of my bulb bed. Between the extremely cold winter and the weird spring the plants are very stressed. When stressed enough a perennial can opt to skip blooming for a year and try again the next. Blooming is expensive energy wise for the plant, skipping it for a year gives them a head start on storing up energy for next year.
Apply an appropriate fertilizer and any other applicable TLC and see if they bloom next year.
This “skip blooming a year” phenomena is being noted in many locations this year, with a considerable number of ornamental and fruit trees, shrubs, and other perennials either not blooming or doing so only minimally. It’s actually a protective mechanism for the plants, even if we find it inconvenient.
If you want to buy some new bulbs and plant them in among the established ones that can’t hurt, either.
UK Cornwall here and round here there fields of dafs that go with very little attendance year after year. They get planted thickly one on top of another too. So they don’t take much care or feeding. tulips though require a deeper hole in planting.
I have an irregular swath across my front yard, containing white crocuses, then lacy white daffodils, then tulips in pale shades of pink and orange. The crocuses came up in clumps of lots of flowers, separated by none. The daffodils came up beautifully, but with a few small bald spots. And one tulip came up, right on the edge next to the driveway. And it’s bright red.
My beautiful “Betty” magnolia tree had two perfect blooms, way at the top. That’s all. My dogwood is finally starting to bloom (should have in mid-April), and some branches have nothing.
Every year is different. This year, spring came late, and some things aren’t coming up at all.
Daffodils probably shouldn’t be in an irrigated bed. Once their foliage dies back they don’t need or want supplemental water.
Last night I was rereading an old issue of Horticulture magazine from 2007 (yes, I need to throw more stuff out) and noticed an article called “Refreshing Daffodils”.
To summarize: the author recommends digging the daffodil clumps up to check on what the problem is, waiting until the leaves have begun to yellow (generally early summer, at least six weeks after flowering). At that point photosynthesis is done for the year and the bulbs won’t lose out on energy storage.
Using a garden fork, ease the tines under the mass of bulbs and pry them up gently, then removing some of the soil with your fingers (which will help break up the clumps into smaller groups).
Check the roots - there should be a “complete ring” of roots at the base of the bulbs. If not, that could mean fungus infection or infestation by the “large narcissus fly” :eek:. If there are hollowed-out eggshell-like bulbs, that means there was a fly infestation and the bulbs should be discarded. If there are a bunch of healthy-looking but small bulbs, they probably outgrew their nutritional supplies. If there are relatively few, small bulbs, suspect a lack of sunlight and/or competition from other plants (possibly including tree roots). If what you find with the bulbs shows that the planting site is OK, you can replant the best-looking bulbs after adding compost/organic soil amendments to the site. Don’t use bulb fertilizer until early August, when a top-dressing of slow-release fertilizer can be used (more can be added in spring after bulb foliage is four inches high or so). The smallest daffodil bulbs can be grown in a nursery bed or other site for a couple of years and then replanted back in the original growing area (though these things are cheap enough that you may want to just buy new ones and get faster bloom that way).
The article is in the June/July 2007 issue of Horticulture.