Daffodil Recovery

Several weeks ago, I dug up a whole slew of daffodil bulbs that my Grandmother had planted. There had to be at least 50 bulbs if separated which I did not get around to doing. Instead I put the clumps of bulbs along with some dirt in one of those 5-gallon pales that men always seem to have stashed away. My plan was to separate the clumps of bulbs and them plant them around the yard, once we'd prepped the garden beds. We are rather slow on projects so we only got one bed done and a few bulbs planted. The rest still sit in the pale. I figured they'll covered in dirt just like when planted so they'd be safe.

Well, then it rained and rain water filled my bucket. Several times. I kept asking my husband to empty the bucket so as not to drown the poor bulbs. I assume that is a possibility. Today i finally got around to starting to rescue my vintage bulbs. My son and I started sifting through the buck 'o stinking mud to pull out the bulbs. This is brings me to another issue......What is the deal with that?! Why does our wet dirt smell like manure?!

Anyway, we pulled out maybe half the bulbs before my son got too hot and I got tired of the smell. Now some of them are drying their muddy selves in the sun.

Gardener Friends - this is the right thing to do......right?