Dahlia Beginnings

Elisabeth — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 17:24:00 GMT

It's time now to start your dahlias. I just potted up a bunch of tubers that look a little like dried-out brown chicken legs. It's hard to believe that come summer the "chicken legs" will produce glorious flowers.

In the beginning, I approached dahlias with caution. I wasn't sure that I was ready for the big "dinner plate" types. It went against my cautious, understated grain. So I started with the single-flowered varieties and enjoyed the summer show when they sprouted. After awhile I eased my way into the doubles and larger-flowered types and found out that bigger blasts of color didn't make my garden explode. I still haven't gotten to the dinner plate dahlias, but it may happen.

Dahlias are great in bouquets and, if they like the conditions, will put out large numbers of flowers. They don't really require much care, other than planting and lifting in cold winter climates. There are many plants that require a great deal more and produce a great deal less.

So, if you are like I was and are a little intimidated by dahlias, it's time to live a little. Order some of the single-flowered varieties and give them a try. It might be a liberating experience.

Dahlias

Elisabeth — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 22:14:00 GMT

Today, while I was out on a walk through my neighborhood, I saw a fabulous display of dahlias. On one side of a blacktop driveway the gardener had planted an entire small bed--at least ten feet long--full of shell pink dahlias, which were in full bloom. These were not the "dinner plate" size dahlias, but the fluffy formal type with flowers about three inches in diameter and heads full of neatly arranged pink petals. Another, slightly smaller border of these pink dahlias ran along one side of the house. In a season when everything seems to be gold and russet and dark green, the sheer exuberance of these pink flowers was breathtaking.

Dahlias have not always been my cup of tea, which shows the influence of early training. My gardener father never grew them, so they always seemed a little strange and over-the-top to me. Fortunately I have outgrown that early prejudice and now I have a few every year in my own garden.

I think many people are wary of dahlias because the ads for them often show the humongous dinner plate size blossoms (usually next to a small child's head for comparison's sake). This is a little scary, since the flowers look as if they've been on steroids. However, dahlias come in all kinds of shapes and sizes, from the little collarette types, with only a single row of petals, to the wild and crazy cactus-flowered varieties, with their slender, curled petals. I tell skeptics that it's just a matter of finding the dahlia variety that suits your personality.

What suits my personality is a flower that blooms from the end of summer right through the first frost, provides much needed color in the fall garden and lasts in a vase indoors. There are lots of plants with a great deal more snob appeal that can't make all those claims.

You can treat dahlias as annuals, but I like to lift and store mine so that I can increase the size of my collection year by year. Soon it will be time to bring the tubers in for the winter, but until then I will continue to be dazzled by their virtuosity.

Growing Wise : dahlias

Dahlia Beginnings

Dahlias