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| After I’ve taken all the cuttings I want off a tuber my plan is to transplant the still sprouting tuber into a pot before it goes into the garden.
My question is about the roots that the tuber has formed. If the tuber has good sprouts already, does it really make much of a difference that some of the roots are severed/broken during the transplant? Of course I will take as much care as I can, but this is undoubtedly going to happen. Cheers,
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Follow-Up Postings:
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- Posted by dahliagardener (My Page) on Sat, Mar 15, 08 at 18:37
| It won't matter as long as you're careful. One trick that I learned from a friend is to take a 1/2 gal. cardboard milk container, staple the top shut, turn it on it's side & cut out what is now the top. You get a long planter & can get a couple of tubers in it. If you leave a bit of a flap when you cut the top out it gives you something to write the name on, too. Then when you plant in the garden you just have to tip the tuber out into your hand & put it in the ground- you don't break nearly as many roots as you do when you're trying to dig it out of a flower pot. |
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- Posted by sturgeonguy 5a Ont Canada (My Page) on Sat, Mar 15, 08 at 20:52
| I am trying to grow pot tubers to make them easier to lift in the fall. So all my cuttings are in 4" square pots which will go into the ground and stay there until their lifted in the fall. I wondered if I could do this with a tuber also. Cheers, |
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| How do you take cuttings off a tuber? I am new at this but doesn't that ruin the tuber to plant? What am I missing? |
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- Posted by sturgeonguy 5a Ont Canada (My Page) on Wed, Mar 19, 08 at 0:06
| There should be a link associated with this message pointing to a really good article on taking cuttings. The short version, after the sprout is ~3" tall, cut it off just above the eye. You get several new sprouts come up around the cut stem, and so on and so on. I have tubers now that have as many as 10 sprouts coming up. Best of all, when you're done taking cuttings, you can still plant the tuber and get a full plant out of it!! Cheers, |
Here is a link that might be useful: How to take cuttings from your new or favorite dahlia tubers
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| On that link, does all that disbranching and disbudding go for some of us that just want a big bushy plant full of flowers? |
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- Posted by sturgeonguy 5a Ont Canada (My Page) on Wed, Mar 19, 08 at 21:06
| If you haven't grown Dahlias before then I would recommend you don't disbud. Debranching should be done on branches that have broken, fallen, or become too laden to hold a shapely position. The 2nd year I would recommend you make attempts at these chores. Having the 1st years experience of what the plants look like really helps when it comes to deciding what you want to cut off before it bloomed. Its not that the link provides bad advice, but its advice that I think is meaningless to anyone who doesn't realize how a Dahlia grows. This applies also to new varieties you haven't grown before. How can you recognize a plant that's overburdened if you have always stripped so much of its growth? Equally, I've grown plants that were way bushier than anyone think's they should be and loved them for their bushiness. But, there are some simple concepts to be learned from those articles. You'll get a better looking flower from a single that you've stripped the side buds from than if you let all 3 grow. Doesn't mean you'll like it better, or that it will look better in a vase...that single flower will be a better representative of the vareity is all. Many varieties, such as Cabana Banana, do better overall if they are stripped to some extent. Cabana Banana, from my experience, just grows "too well!" Cut it back in a variety of ways and it will just be a better plant. To each his own, how will you know until you see it for yourself? If you can, in your first year, try to have 2 of each variety. On one, experiment, on the other, let nature take its course. MAKE NOTES!! and take pictures. Big and bushy, and full of flowers, don't naturally go hand in hand. A plant has to devote resources to foilage, and/or flowers. If its doing both, neither will be at their fullest. I mentioned before about an AA, Purple Taiheijo, that was very full, lush with foilage, and had lots of flowers. Unfortunately, however, the flowers were on short stems and so ended up within the foilage. This meant that they weren't presented well, some were not fully formed, and others died early because they weren't getting enough sun. Theres more to a plant that simply its food and sun...;-] So if you haven't before, try what you think you'd like...but don't think your Dahlia sucked because of the results...;-] Cheers, |
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