Daffodils rest dormant during the dry parts of the year, emerging during the rainy season to flower. They’ll store energy, expand and go dormant until the next year, all with no supplemental water (as long as we have sufficient rainfall).
It might seem strange to pair succulents with lush daffodils, but all these plants are water efficient. The succulents – agave and aloe – store water in their tissues and have adaptations to minimize water loss through their leaves. Daffodils just go underground when things are dry. Annual wildflowers use another strategy: spend the dry season as seeds, limiting growth to the lush rainy season and following spring.
There are a lot of varieties of daffodils, most of which will naturalize perfectly well in California. They don’t need a lot of winter chill, and will happily multiply in the ground over a long period.
I suppose we could dig the bulbs at the beginning of autumn, spread them out and have an even wider swath of flowers, but we like the look of concentrated clumps. Who knows, we might even add more varieties some autumn when the bulbs are available.
The only essential care is that you do not cut the leaves until they’ve completely yellowed in Spring. The leaves gather energy, promoting next year’s display. Our solution is to plant low ornamental grasses that disguise the leaves without blocking too much needed sunlight. The grasses are completely cut back before the daffodils emerge, so they don’t interfere with the display of flowers.
These bulbs are not native to California, but don’t spread wildly. If you want them to spread, you’ll have to dig the bulbs or plant them in wide drifts where they’ll naturalize and multiply in place into clumps.
