I wish my Dahlias flowered like that ! I dont have enough sun in my yard. I am glad I pointed you to "how to post a pic" - these are gorgeous - thanks

Were you part of the tuber swap that Kerrianne organized this spring? I recognize most of those dahlia names and see a bunch I wish I had opted for. I love the Show & Tell - thats a crazy bloom!

Mandolls, Thanks for the compliments. This is the first year that mine have done so well and its probably because I made a new dahlia garden that is in full sun all day long. I also give them lots and lots of water because the summers here in northern Utah can get pretty hot.

I was not part of the dahlia swap in the spring but I did trade some tubers with Kerianne last fall. If you are interested in trading, I am sure I could give you Show N Tell. That picture does not even show all of the blooms on that plant. There are at least 20 out right now! And that one didn't even bloom last year. I have several plants that have a lot of blooms on them. I will try to post more pictures later. And thanks for telling me how to post, I appreciate it!

Linda

Here are a few more shots of my dahlias.

Fire Pot
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Punkin Spice
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Hot Tamale
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Lucky Ducky
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Raspberry Punch
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Helen Richmond
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Wow and more Wow. I had to pull down 2 trees in my yard this year, and now have a patch with a lot more sun. I think I will move most of my Dahlias over there next year. If I have 3 or 4 full open blooms at a time on a plant I am excited. I usually only have one or two blooms at a time, though I admit most of them get cut pretty quickly and brought inside.

I would love to do some trading with you. I havent seen Kerianne on this forum at all this summer. She orchestrated a great tuber swap this spring between about six of us. I ended up with over twenty new dahlias. Now I only want more.

Mandolls, I know what you mean by wanting more cuz I feel the same way. I have 28 varities and about 40 plants in my yard. I have already decided to make the dahlia garden a lot bigger since they are doing so well in that location.

I also had a big tree that was dying so we cut it down and suddenly I had a lot more shade. Not so good for the Hostas but everything else loves the sun.

I am shocked at how many flowers I have this year and the plants look a lot better too. Before they were planted against a fence and did not get full sun. They were tall and leggy. They did bloom but no where near what they are doing this year.

A friend of mine at work went to the Swan Island Dahlia festival last week and I was so jealous...maybe I will go next year. They told her they water their dahlias for 4 hrs every 2 days with rain bird sprinklers and the more water you give them the more they bloom. I didn't think they would need that much water up in Oregon.

If you give me your email address, I will send you a list of the tubers I have and we can decide which ones we want to trade. Some of mine are new this year, so I don't know how many tubers they will produce...hopefully a lot!

We can swap them once we dig them up in the fall if you want. Thats what Kerianne and I did last fall.

How do you store your tubers? Kerianne did hers in saran wrap. I have never done that but I am thinking I might try it this year. I don't have very good luck with peat moss and always end up losing the ones I like the most.

Thanks,
Linda

Tropic lover.........your dahlias are fantastic....so beautiful! i am really jealous because this summer has been awful ......the dahlias just seemed to stay small...
i will get a few flowers but nothing like most years.....
thanx for showing them to us......

carol

Hey Tropic Lover:
What a rainbow of color! Mine are blooming well too, but I too find a reason to be very jealous! I've planted 5 of my favorite dahlia and of the 80+ plants (out of 212) that have bloomed, do you know how many Show N Tells I've seen? ZERO. It's the dahlia that I look forward to the most every year, no matter what else I may have planted. I've got some new favorites this year, but nothing has ever surpassed Show N Tell. And your Show N Tell's are gorgeous, and I'm totally green!

Phyllis

Carol, thanks for the compliments! I heard about the heatwave the midwest has had this year and I just can't imagine how awful that was and how hard it must be to even keep your plants alive in that heat. Hopefully you have a better summer next year.

Phyllis, I have had show-n-tell for about 4 years now and usually I would just get a couple of blooms on it. Last year I got none at all because it froze before the bud opened up. And the sad part was it didn't even freeze here until mid November. So this year I was determined to see that one bloom and I dug it out of storage around the end of March and potted it up in the house. I was unable to plant my dahlias in the ground until the end of May because we had such a cold, wet spring. When I planted it, it was maybe 8 inches high but it really took off and has been blooming like CRAZY! It currently has 20 blooms on it and many more buds.

And I have to admit that I am envious of your very large collection of dahlias. I only have 27 varities. You should post some pictures of your favorites.

Linda

Carol, thanks for the compliments! I heard about the heatwave the midwest has had this year and I just can't imagine how awful that was and how hard it must be to even keep your plants alive in that heat. Hopefully you have a better summer next year.

Phyllis, I have had show-n-tell for about 4 years now and usually I would just get a couple of blooms on it. Last year I got none at all because it froze before the bud opened up. And the sad part was it didn't even freeze here until mid November. So this year I was determined to see that one bloom and I dug it out of storage around the end of March and potted it up in the house. I was unable to plant my dahlias in the ground until the end of May because we had such a cold, wet spring. When I planted it, it was maybe 8 inches high but it really took off and has been blooming like CRAZY! It currently has 20 blooms on it and many more buds.

And I have to admit that I am envious of your very large collection of dahlias. I only have 27 varities. You should post some pictures of your favorites.

Linda

Linda - I am in the same boat, I have lots of tubers that are new this year, so I dont know how well they will multiply yet, but I would definitely like to do a trade with you. If you go to "my page", you will see a "send me an e-mail" link. You can contact me through that. I am photographing each one as I get blooms so It will be easy to show you what I have (if they all bloom )

Geof

Oh and to answer your question about storing. I use the saran method too. Each tuber gets dusted with sulfur and then individually wrapped in saran. I have a good cool place to store them. Out of about 125 tubers, I think I lost three to rot last year. And I think that was because I got lazy about labeling each one and decided I could group them into big storage baggies - I think the extra layer of plastic and having them all atop each other caused the rotting.

Ok, I guess I am going to try that method this year. I was just worried about not being able to see the eyes after I dig them up. For the past couple of years we have not had a killing frost until mid november but you just never know when it will happen. I sent you an email with a list of the varities that I have.

Gorrrrgeous! Luv them all. Do you mind telling me how you support them? I was trying to tell in your pics and I can see some wooden supports on a couple of them but the dahlias get so big here its hard for me to stake them so I have resorted to tomato cages which doesn't look real attractive but works pretty good. Your flowers really are quite beautiful! Judy

Thanks for the dahlia fix! I am in Ankara, Turkey this week and all I see are roses and a few bedding plants. I am enjoying it though!

Your Show n Tell's are over the top wonderful! I don't think I ever got it to bloom in our cool climate. Maybe I will try again in my sunniest spot...oh wait, that's where I put my greenhouse, LOL. Don't you love "I'm a Hottie"!

Nice job!

Prettypetals, thanks for the compliments! I just used 5' tall wooden stakes. They work OK on some plants but I have had to add a few more to support the biggest plants. Raspberry Punch for example is huge and I am having a hard time keeping that one up.

Lizalily, thank you too! Yes, I do love I'm a Hottie, that color is to die for! And so is the Show-N-Tell. It has never bloomed like that before and I just love it. Our climate is pretty hot in the summer, in the 90's most of the time. This year we got lucky and only had 2 days above 100 degrees. I always thought dahlias did the best up in the pacific northwest. Now that our temps have cooled down to the 80's with nights in the 50's it seems like the flowers seem even more beautiful.

Thanks

Linda :)

Lizalily, I forgot to say wow! That must be an amazing trip. Never would have thought they would grow roses there.

I also have a question for you since you grow dahlias for cut flowers. I am wanting to get a white ball type and have found a couple that I like. One is L'ancresse and the other Brookside Snowball. Do you grow either of these? I was wondering which was the best one. I thought it might be nice to add to mine own cut flower arrangements that I do for myself or to take to work.

Do you have any opinion on either of these two?

So can I bother ya one more time?? Please!!! Do you start tying them when they are short and they continue to grow and you continue to tie or do you do it a little different? Your pics are soooooooooooo super pretty. Judy

Hi Judy, I put the stake in when I plant them but I didn't tie them to it until they were about 3 feet tall. Once they got taller I tied some of the branches to the stake also. I had to add a few more stakes later on because the plants were getting so big! Many of them are probably 6 feet tall. Next year I going to see if I can find a taller stake. This is the first year that they have done this well and I am very excited about it!

Thanks again for your compliments! I just went outside and picked some more to bring in the house because I just love looking at them. You should post some pictures of yours. I would love to see them!

Linda

Hey Linda, I can see why you love looking at them. I only have two that are blooming and one is a simple white and the other one, well two, that are almost identical. They both bloom pretty good but I am still having trouble keeping them upright. The tomato cages are working ok but they were already pretty tall before I put them on so I kinda messed up half the plant putting them over the plant. grrr..... I haven't taken many pics of them due to it not looking real pretty with part of the plant laying on the ground and the other part standing nice in the cage. lol!! I think I am going to cut off the part still outside the cage just to clean up the area a little.

I had decided I was going to just give up and give them to my sister since I had the hardest time keeping them staked but then they started blooming and I changed my mind. lol! This is why I am hounding you about how you stake yours. heehee!! My ground is so hard in most of the areas and it makes it hard to get a stake in good enuf to keep standing when they get so tall and bushy. Plus they are already in the ground and I don't dig them up because they do return every year.

I really liked how your stake looked compared to my ugly tomato cage so I may try that next year again and just try to get it in the ground good enough so it will stay upright. Thanks again for your tips and if you have anymore please feel free to let me know. I never fertilize mine either so if you have a feeding program I would love to know that too. Good grief you might as well come to Georgia and grow them for me. haha!! Judy

Hi Judy, You are so funny! LOL I have never been to Georgia but I have been to your neighboring states South Carolina and Florida. I might like it there though since you have a better growing season for plants. You are very lucky you don't have to dig and store them. That's the part I don't like about growing them. But they are worth it.

When I plant them in the spring I add bone meal to the planting hole and then around July I give them some more fertilizer just sprinkled around the plants on the ground. The fertilizer I use is Ultra Green bloom and bulb food 4-10-10. I believe you want the nitrogen (which is the 1st number to be half as much as the other 2 numbers. It seems to work well. Other than that I just give them water pretty much every day. Mine are planted in a slightly raised bed so it has good drainage and it gets full sun all day long. This is the 1st year planted in this area and they seem to love it.

I have grown them for about 5 years and have never had much luck with them and I thought about not planting them anymore. I am so glad I moved them to a new spot because they are doing so much better! I can't wait until next because I am making my garden bigger and already have a trade set up to get a bunch more tubers.

Linda :)

Thanks Linda,

So are you in Utah? Thats the only place I can think of with UT. lol! This old brain doesn't think to hard nowadays.

I do like not having to dig them up because my lazy self probably wouldn't do it. I am the one that just plants something and then moves it around three times before it finally gets in a perfect spot. Not the best of practice for sure.

Thanks for giving me your feeding program. Obviously it works great from the looks of your pictures. They truely are gorgeous. I bet next year it will be even prettier with all the enlarging you are doing. Good luck with your trade.

Take care and thanks a bunch, Judy

Sorry, Tropic Lover. I have never grown either of those two whites. I really don't like the balls quite as much as some of the other types of dahlias. The only whites I am growing this year are Bowen and a very small white one I can't think of the name of right now. I used to have several of Connell's ball shaped dahlias, but they are long gone.