Record keeping for Dahlias

Bessie

I'm sitting here staring at my planting chart, figuring out where the latest purchased dahlias will go. Last year I made a spreadsheet of all the Dahlias I purchased/planted. I read that Katherine Albrecht uses Ancestry software to keep track of her hybridizing.
I'd love to hear your thoughts.
1) What, if anything, do you use for Dahlia record keeping.
2) What functionality/software do you wish you had for record keeping?

SteveM

Bessie 1) What, if anything, do you use for Dahlia record keeping.

This year, the process I use in the field for record keeping:

I flag a "keeper" with a number only (e.g. "1-25")
I take a short video of the seedling with an audio description in the video, (e.g., "1-25, seedling of blah, blah; bloom is blah, blah; plant is blah, blah; etc.").

My intention is to transfer the audio description to some sort of hard copy this winter when I have more time but we will see...,

Teddahlia

In 1983 they came out with a program called Lotus 123. Microsoft came out with Excel a few years later. We had to learn them for reports at work. It was state of the art when I did our first spreadsheet for the dahlia seedlings in about 1993. We have a file for every year from 1993 to 2022.. Losers not listed. Winners get a line entry and sometimes remarks.

blown_dry

I use Excel! I have a spreadsheet with my orders, and even use it for the planting chart. It's easy to move the images around. But, I do have to insert all the images in the first place.

Bessie

blown_dry I love seeing all your images😃, thank you. I'm excited to see what you grow!
I used Excel too last year. I'm really longing for a database so I can sort on color, type, tuber vendor, etc. I collect information on the seedlings, and although I have a dedicated notebook, it just seems so 1970's. I also have a 3 ring binder that holds all my tuber purchases.

Dahlia53

blown_dry Wow! I love your system of inserting photos in a spreadsheet! I never have tried it but want to, now that I see yours! I have only used Excel a few times but I have something called Calc which is similar. I'd love to know more on how to do this. It's beautifu!

TryingToGrow

Newbie here. This year I upped my game from 7 dahlia plants to 20 dahlia plants. I created a spreadsheet to track info about them, but I am wondering if I should be tracking more. Any recommendations would be appreciated.
Name
Number plants/tubers
Status
Height (in)
Spacing (in)
Flower size (in)
Flower type
Color
Year introduced
Purchased from

SteveM

TryingToGrow Any recommendations would be appreciated.

I would include a photo if your spreadsheet has that feature.

Bessie

TryingToGrow I like to keep track of the date planted, and if it is a saved tuber from last year, purchased tuber, or a cutting. For me it's also important to note the first bloom date, however I can easily track that by looking at the date of the first photo I have for the season. I also added a quick rating system for an important feature to me, overall vigor. I rate the lowest vigor to highest vigor, +, ++, +++.

Teddahlia

Sounds stupid but recording where each plant is located is good information especially if tags are lost(chickens love to pull out plant tags).

Bessie

Teddahlia I've had to use my site planting plan more than once to ID a Dahlia! Unfortunately this has been a slow moving year for me, and no site plan yet.

Teddahlia

Bessie: I like dahlias with lots of vigor too but the term is a bit undefined even though we both use it a lot. Probably we would have slightly different definitions. Vigor may be broken down into a whole bunch of traits and your list may be somewhat different than mine. And with all traits, too vigorous is a fault too. I tossed a Bloomquist variety for being too vigorous: too tall, a coarse looking plant, and I could have lived with that but the tuber clump weighed 40 pounds and took super effort to just get it out of the ground. Then my crates were so heavy heavy , I struggled to haul them inside. Then I struggled to wash the humongous clumps and when I got them to the dividing table the tubers were packed around the stalk so firmly that I had get out bigger tools.

Bessie

Teddahlia yes, good point. The important point here is what is pleasing to you, and what are your goals? The record keeping will keep track of the many data points that reflect the end goal. I'm my situation, my main goal is to produce hybrids that make ideal plants for home floral bouquets as well as attempt to produce desirable, productive, plants for cut flower farmers.

Teddahlia

Trait number one is also not definable. We want pretty dahlias. That is another word that defies definition. Just a day or two ago, Margaret and I declared that it is now our number one trait. Lots of ugly flowers have nice form. Now, that does not mean we are abandoning the form trait . It is more like we are lowering our form requirements if the flower is pretty. Remember pretty is not a trait listed in the American Dahlia Society classification handbook. Why would people grow dahlias if they were not pretty?

I think this one is pretty and so does Margaret. 2nd year seedling.

TryingToGrow

Thank you for all the great suggestions. I will work on incorporating them. I am also tracking my newbie fails to prevent future issues.

I am attaching images of

the google sheets I am using to track.

Dahlia53

TryingToGrow i like how you mapped out your beds, very clever. I always draw out my maps and they are a mess but essential! Will check out google sheets for logging placement in the beds. I used to keep better records and now I just do location of each plant. I keep a notebook for other things about the dahlias - so old fashioned. How smart of you to note where bought, and introduction year and breeder. Do you note date planted and first bloom of each too? I used to! Now I'm just lazy - but you may have inspired me.

This year I must reduce due to back problems so I'll try to stop at 40 to 50. I may try your spreadsheet method when planting next year. Thanks for sharing; so many wonderful ideas in this thread.

@Teddahlia - that's a gorgeous bouquet! What is that bright scarlet small dahlia at top? Love it. I did buy bright yellow flags for marking what must be dug. Then if an early cold or bad weather hits, I'll have the keepers dug first. that lavender waterlily type? seedling you showed is so pretty; 24-95. Love that one.

Teddahlia

Record keeping is good but keeping records of everything is not good. Over the years , we have found that "life" gets in the way and some records are not kept. If you are trying to record too much data when it comes to "crunch" time and you are out of town unexpectedly or the dog is sick or you get sick or the weather turns to shit, you need to have an "absolute minimum" system set up. Over the years, our biggest issue is we need to dig the good ones and leave the others in the ground. Flagging tape with nothing on it is the lowest level of record keeping. Tie it to the stalk and you will know that this plant must be dug in the Fall. Yes, that sounds easy but we have even failed to do this on occasion.

TryingToGrow

Dahlia53 I am going to start putting the first bloom date. Fortunately, I took photos of the first blooms this year so I am able to add the date after the fact. I should add date planted too, good idea! I will do that.

blown_dry

Dahlia53
A lot of images on the internet, a person can right click and select 'Copy Image'. Then I click over to Calc/Excel and do CTRL-V or right click and select paste and there it is. Doesn't get much easier than that. After that you can right click on the image in Calc and crop is an option in the drop down, as well as dragging the corners to resize. I came up with some sizes based on bloom size to resize the images to. That's why the images are different sizes.

Teddahlia

"...that's a gorgeous bouquet! What is that bright scarlet small dahlia at top? Love it." Picture is of a display done by Margaret for a funeral 20 years ago. I know the names of only a couple of the f lowers.