Bulbs, corms, tuberous roots and stems, rhizome and pseudobulbs are specialized vegetative structures that function as primary food storage organ.
These plants are generally herbaceous perennials. This means that shoots die at the end of the growing season but the plant survives in the ground as a dormant fleshy organ. The organ can produce new shoots the next season. The main purpose of specialized structures or bulbs is for storage and reproduction. In the bulbs centre, there will either be a vegetative meristem that will grow leaves or undeveloped flower shoot. Meristems found in the axils of the scales produce bulblets.
Development of bulblets
When bulblets are fully grown, they are called offsets. In some lily species, bulblets can develop in the leaf axils above the ground. These are called bulbils. If a bulblet grows underground it‘s called a stem bulblet.
Corms like gladiolus and freesia are grown through offsets, scoring and scaling and tuberous roots like sweet potatoes and dahlia are multiplied through adventitious bud development.
Different propagations
Tuberous stems include potatoes and tuberous begonias. They are propagated using axillary budswhereas rhizomes like bamboo are grown using apical axillary buds. Bulbs are commonly propagated through offsets, scoring and scaling. Examples of bulbs include onions, garlic and lilies.
Lastly Pseudobulbs like epiphytic orchids are multiplied through adventitious and axillary buds. To sum up there many kinds of bulbs and each of them have unique propagation methods.
