Dahlia seed will produce plants that bloom the first year from seed, but don't plant in January. If you are starting in the house or greenhouse, plant in March or April, depending on when you would normally plant the tubers. Most of the seed growers I know start them April 1st. My son direct sows his seed May 1st. They bloom the first year and look just like plants started from tubers. They do not come true from the parent plant. That is how new varieties come about. If you have open centered varieties you grow, most of the seed will be open centered (much easier for bees to gather pollen from the open centered varieities). It takes a lot of plants to come up with a good one worth keeping, but it's a lot of fun to see what you get. Kind of like opening a package at Christmas.

Teresa

I grew seeds from Thompson & Morgan last year and some did well and bloomed a lot. I tried Bishop's Children and Collarette. Frost wiped out most of the tuber-grown dahlias but the seed-grown ones still have flowers on them. They are in a place that gets better airflow though.