The little blue ones are "scilla"....

I feel your pain. :-( I did the same thing yesterday and it has been snowing/raining all day. Darn!

Many people suggested various kinds of repellent but I happened to have a bag of cayenne pepper and have not had time to go to the store for anything else.

Most of my crocus in front of the house were eaten to the nub. A lot of tulips were also eaten. Rabbits are the culprits now.

Very few of my Scilla are barely visible. Yours will probably come up in a week or two. They are very easy going unlike Chionodoxa who do not like to be crowded.

Keep up the hope. Spring will surely be here. ;-)

I dusted with garlic powder a few days ago, and the tree rats dug up one of the few areas where dutch iris bloomed last year. After deciding the new batch are going into pots for indoor forcing, I mixed up a batch of garlic powder, chili pepper and blood meal. I was out sprinkling the backyard in the snow.

That's good to hear about the scilla, I planted mixed colors this fall and don't see any of them yet. I've got foliage coming up elsewhere from last year, not sure if those are scilla or puschkini.

Looks like most of the crocuses made it, have a few blooming (or trying to). Lots of tulip leaves, but also lots of empty places. Daffs are up a few inches too. When do alliums sprout? Don't think I see any yet, but those should bloom later so I'm not too worried yet.

Established hyacinths are poking up, but don't see any new ones yet.

My daffs are up about 2" now. We've had below average temps this March. This coming week, things should really start popping up. We're supposed to be getting temps near 50. I sure hope so. I'm getting antsy to see some flowers popping up.

Kat

I am going to get blood meal this morning. We have a larger population of rabbits this year. The hord of tree rats is always there. Darn! I saw a few lily bulblets on the ground last week but did not have time to replant them. Now they are gone. :-(

Some of my established daffodils have been up since fall, with brown tips, of course. Others are 6 - 7 inches tall, yet others are about 3" . They range from 2 to 18 years old. I didn't not add any daff last fall.

6 Allium 'Globemaster' are about 2 1/2" tall. 4 in 5 gallon pots are almost a foot tall, but they were surrounded with bags of leaves. The rest are still invisible. I hope they make it though, since they cost a bundle. I think a few of albopilosum are poking though, but I am not so sure. I live in the city toward O'Hare. Maybe it is a little warmer than where you are.

Established hyacinths came up last month, very few new ones just barely peek through. Crocuses don't really open. They just stay globlet like because there is not a lot of sunshine and it is cold. Sigh.......

I planted a lot of Dutch Iris last fall. The leaves came up almost immediately. Now they are limp and raggedy looking. :-( How old are yours? Do they come back OK?
On the other hand, dwarf iris are blooming now. :-)

Good luck, everyone. :-D

Almost everything that bloomed last spring put up leaves in the fall, they look ragged now. Even some of the hyacinth tips were up in December.

I'm not sure about the Dutch Iris, I bought the Blue Magic ones from Walmart which don't have zone info. Info on the internet is all over the place. Out of 20 planted, two clumps bloomed but the tree rats kept going after them. They even dug up the blooming plants. I thought I'd planted them late, so was going to try again earlier this year.

Not sure how many of the foliage only ones from last year are still there, that's another area the tree rats have been going after.

We have plenty of predator scent around because the dog hates squirrels. She keeps them out when she's in the yard, but they go nuts when she's in the house.

All I have blooming so far are crocus, and even most of those are still buds.

so you just go out and sprinkle this stuff on the tips that are peeking out of the ground? i've got deer in my yard. i've been trying various things to rid myself of them...but alas...no luck.

Allium Giganteum in WI won't come for a few weeks yet. The smaller ones like Moly are a bit earlier. Expect blooms in late May/ June.

I bought some more stuff called "scoot squirrel" that you spray on the ground where the bulbs are planted. They were continuing to dig with the sprinkled cayenne and blood meal. This stuff is basically pepper spray (capsaicin is the main ingredient)

My son thought you were supposed to actually chase the squirrels around and spray it in their little faces...

I never had much success with tulips and crocuses UNTIL I ditched the garlic/pepper/repellants. Last year I encased the bulbs in teeny wire cages I made and lo and behold no empty spaces this year. Lots of foliage all around. However, the whole wire cage thing wore me out.I eman, you can do that for maybe 10 bulbs but then it gets pretty lame. I am not going to 'do' tulips anymore. Daffs and hyacinths are so critter resistant that the tulips aren't worth it.

Well, I was having a problem too. Something was eating my tulip foliage down to the ground and I didn't know what it was. Sprayed 'Deer Away" which is basically an ammonia solution and it's working. I have squirrels, rabbits and deer and God knows what else out here. The remaning bulbs are coming up now. Can't hurt, might help.

I have heard that used cat litter works well. However do you really want that around your flower beds? I shoot the bunnies with my pellet gun in the evenings and early mornings before work (I know it's mean but how else am I going to keep my flowers safe).

My wife is seriously thinking of getting an air rifle for the squirrels. Ate dozens, if not over a hundred of our crocuses - actually dug up the bulbs but left the foliage and flowers just lying there as they bloomed. She's gonna sit out in the garage at 5AM and snipe them through the broken window :)

Being the original poster and seeing that this thread is taking a murderous turn I have to tell you all that I think the cayenne(and the blood meal and something called scoot squirrel which is basically spray cayenne) worked. I think that once I did that no more bulbs were eaten.

However, many many were eaten last fall after I planted and this spring before I treated. But I'm trying to dwell on the positive and the fact that my sweet little scilla are blooming and my tulips are budding and I have been temporarily distracted from shooting squirrels.

Now, if I could just do something about my neighbor who has decided to "divide" the hostas between our houses(that have questionable ownership) and hurl dirt and roots and sod clumps all over my garden and the tiny little annual reseeds that have started coming up. Now THAT I can get homicidal about...Maybe not, but it is really making me crazy. I mean she has an entire yard full of things to do. She is not a gardener and has no gardens or plants save the one little coral-colored impatiens hanging basket that hangs on her front porch and dies every summer due to too much sun and no water.

Anyway, I'm trying to dwell on the positive. Does anyone else have insane neighbors who are driving them to be likewise? I guess this is the time of year that people come out of their houses for better or worse...

Luckily I have a big corner lot and the neighbor to the back has a fence and the one to my side can only grow grass. The side neighbor did cut down a 20yr+ trumpet vine which I so wished was on my property. I almost cried to see it go. I felt guilty as I gave him the saw to do it with.