Geneva man plants thousands of tulips for spring display

GENEVA – While driving on Fargo Boulevard near Route 31 in early spring, it is impossible to miss a kaleidoscope of color featuring thousands of tulips in bloom.

This natural wonder is the work of Paul Duke, 62, a retired oil and gas engineer, who plants tulips in the thousands on his quarter-acre property. After he and his wife moved to Geneva 12 years ago, from Calgary, Alberta, Canada, the planting started as a hobby and continued.

“This year, I planted just under 6,000,” Duke said. “Usually, they don’t all come back. Maybe half you plant one year will come back.”

He’s planted 5,000 and 6,000 at a time over the years, with maybe 1,000 to 2,500 coming back and some blooming again four years later.

“It takes 20 days during the fall starting in September, and sometimes to early December, to get everything in,” Duke said. “I don’t do it 20 days in a row, but I might plant 400 in one day and 500 the next day and then be off for a few days.”

Duke’s property also sports flowering redbuds, crabapples, hawthorne and catalpa trees, 600 Virginia bluebells and maybe 900 softball-sized purple allium. Other areas are host to an ever-growing perennial garden and a vegetable garden.

“I always gardened on a big scale,” Duke said. “I wanted a garden on a larger scale, and I have the opportunity, and so I do.”