General Dahlia Chat 2024

Krista · 2024-01-05T01:50:48+00:00

When do we grow up and stop ordering more tubers than we can possibly fit into the space we have, for the next season? Is that something I can look forward t...

calico20hill

I am glad I did not miss much, LOL. Mainly what I miss is meeting and talking to others who love dahlias like I do....or just meeting and talking to someone who does not live in my house!

Speaking of which, hubby is off for another effort at replacing his knee this next week. Then he can get the other one done in a few weeks. Then he will be out of excuses (grin).

I picked my first seedling bloom today. It is pretty but needs a better center/

Bessie

Hollyhill Daydream is blooming like crazy. It's my favorite waterlily, so far.

MIDahlias

Teddahlia Once the flower foam is shredded, where do you mail it? is it expensive to mail?

Teddahlia

"...where do you mail it? is it expensive to mail?"
They have not made the first test batch and the foam may be the wrong one. Shipping a 4 foot tall by 2 feet wide bag that weighs 10 pounds would be more than a little bit expensive. I am sure they are planning on delivering the foam to the club meetings for distribution.
Meanwhile, many of the shows use oasis bricks that cost quite a bit. Many things have been tried without success and most suggestions are too heavy.

BarryO

Teddahlia

We use oasis bricks at the Northeast shows and are pleased with the results. Hardest part is removing the oasis from the vases after the shows conclude.

MIDahlias

BarryO
The trick to emptying the vases is to use bread trays and two garbage cans. One for water and one for foam. Place a bread tray over over a garbage can for water, turn the vase upside down... tap... tap... the water drains into the can and the foam stays on the bread tray. It helps to get some if the water out of the foam too. Transfer the foam from the tray to the foam can.

Clover

Teddahlia

Red Pig Tools makes one of my favorite weeding tools. I have their Cape Cod weeder and it sees a lot of use.

Justafewdahlias

Are there certain forms of dahlias that are known close at night? Or is it just random? I’m guessing it would only be in blooms that don’t have a ton of petals

Teddahlia

Many waterlilies close at night. We have one(so far a private flower)that is mostly closed during the day and closes more at night. It is very tall too. The Boleys have one that they have named and they showed it in the novelty class but the judges did not agree that it was novelty. It is to me.

Justafewdahlias

Teddahlia are there any photos of this novelty class dahlia? I watched a video about what is or isn’t a novelty dahlia. I want to say it was a speaker who hybridized dahlias giving a presentation to an ADS club chapter. After this video I am much more curious about novelty dahlias and the debate about what is or isn’t one

Juliarugula

I think I must be the only person in the world that isn’t a fan of the “petals closing at night” thing. I suppose it’s charming on an individual flower, but it’s soooo annoying to use those flowers in an arrangement. At night, your arrangements suddenly has a bunch of big gaps all over the place.

Justafewdahlias

Juliarugula I hadn’t thought of that downside, but veryyyy good point! 😂 I always notice when I am out in my yard in the evening and think “awww how sweet the flowers are going to bed”…I tend to do all one variety when I bring flowers inside in a vase (mostly cuz I have no design skills or not a lot of things blooming at the same time) so I never thought about the gaps problem till you mentioned this

Teddahlia

It would be nice if someone would list those that do not close at night. Or, it may be matter of degree too.

MissyWeitzel

I filled my first 2 florist orders of the season this week and made my first ever bridal bouquet for a neighbor! I simultaneously never want to do anyone's wedding flowers and also really want to do someone's wedding flowers. 😅

Lakeview Lucky

Juliarugula

MissyWeitzel I’d love to see photos of your bouquet! (Maybe you already posted on Facebook - I’ve been a little Facebook “light” these days…). I’ve never had any desire to do a wedding, but I always thought bridal bouquets look like a lot of fun!

Teddahlia

Wedding flowers are very nerve racking for the grower. Margaret did several weddings and I remember she had about 10 large vases and attempted (she succeeded)to put the same flowers in each one. She quit doing weddings soon after. You have to charge double as the time it takes to do their "special colors" and other requests adds up. And then they send a really small car to pick them up and have no containers.

calico20hill

And then there was the bride's mother who decided to set the back yard tables in the morning to get that task done. It was one of our very hot days and she set the flowers out early in the morning. I had frantic bridesmaids looking at my farm booth at the Farmer's Market for replacement flowers about 11 AM.....They were NOT happy with the bride's mother!

MissyWeitzel

Juliarugula
I learned how to do a spiral hand tied bouquet from watching YouTube videos and happened to have all sorts of fun things like poppy pods and cress and lisianthus and yarrow plus a couple white dahlias ready. I found videos that were really helpful with the way they're filmed. If you want to watch, go on YouTube and search, 'Bourbon and Bouquets spiral hand-tied bouquets' and watch part 1 and part 2. I watched them twice, practiced twice, and I think I'll be doing more of my arrangements this way too - the way the flowers all come together is really nice. It's just in a jar here, but I tied a natural twine ribbon around it too. Definitely things I'd change but I'm proud of my first one!

edewitt

I thought a couple of my tubers had multiple sprouts on the tuber and everything seemed normal. I looked closer today to see that some of those stalks are nwo forming little yellow blooms on the stems under the strange leaves. I freaked out for a couple of seconds until I realized what probably happened. Turns out the soil my girlfriend gave me probably had little seed potatoes in it from an old raised bed. You can see the left half is the doomed potato plant and the smaller right portion is the actual dahlia plant.

I'm mostly posting this to remind myself not to freak out in the future.

Juliarugula

MissyWeitzel yesterday I was asked to do a wedding for the first time. …. I declined …. I think I’d spend the whole month leading up to it worrying about it. It was hard to say no though. 😬

Krista

MissyWeitzel Your bouquet is beautiful! Thank you for sharing your resource; 'Bourbon and Bouquets spiral hand-tied bouquets' parts 1 and 2, on YouTube. I watched them and learned a lot! I want to try to build my skillset in building bouquets and begin to experiment with floral arrangements this summer and these videos were great!

Juliarugula

So pretty! I love the cosmos buds with the wavy stems!

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