Here we are again at the end or is it the start of another season. Time to sit down and contemplate the year that has passed and make plans for the coming season. By all accounts the length and breadth of the country has suftered similarly with poor weather throughout the summer. Here at Chryston the main problem the whole season was the constant cold wind blowing from the very first day of planting. All my plants turned yellow and refused to move. Whether the yellowing was due to having dosed the soil with sulphur to compensate for the high Ph or whether it was due to the cold I don't know. Anyway there was nothing else I could do but put on the covers and enclose the open ends with Rocolene. In theory this should have helped the situation but no improvement was visibly obvious. No chance of the dahlias making Ayr show, and it was doubtful if we would have any dahlia blooms for the Glasgow Evergreen.
First disappointment of the season was when Jo Anne, Trengrove Tauranga and Linda's Chester all turned out to be throwing single blooms. Bad stock I was told but that was little consolation for all the work that had gone into producing the plants in the first place. Next disappointment was finding out all the blooms of Hillcrest Desire had flat petals, more bad stock? What a start to the season and we haven't even been to our first show. I had high hopes for those varieties of small cactus because last year they were at the forefront of my exhibits, but alas I never exhibited a bloom all season.
I should really start the second episode of this saga at the back end of '92. If you recall I was growing under glass. This turned out to be unsuccessful and since the glasshouse had seen better days it was decided to replace two of the bays with a canopy structure. This is similar to a polytunnel the difference being the sides are straight to six feet. The dimensions are 54 feet by 27 feet wide and it is manufactured from 2.5 inch steel pipe. The main problem we encountered when erecting the structure was trying to start off square. However after much head scratching everything went together very well, all that remained to do was concrete the legs in position. This area was to hold approximately 250 dahlia plants and a further 150 dahlias were covered by an erection made from scaffolding tubes. Both sites are irrigated by means of porous pipe coupled through Chempak dilutors, 150 micron filters and anti-syphon valves. The porous pipe is manufactured from old car tyres and the anti-syphon valves are a requirement of the local water authority.
At the beginning of the year I sent six ounces of soil off to be analysed. The reasoning behind that was I thought the soil would be high in salts due to the area where the canopy now stands had been covered from mother nature for the past thirty or more years. Following the recommendations from the soil laboratory I waited for a nice calm day before proceeding to apply the Sulphur and Kieserite along with Chempak Top Dressing. The whole concoction was cultivated into the top few inches of soil. Not long after planting out the plants started to turn yellow and it was a case of reaching for the Epsom Salts and dosing them once each week. The Epsom Salts did the trick alright but I didn't know if the Sulphur was causing the yellowing of the leafs or the cold weather. It wasn't until the middle of July that the plants really seemed to take hold and after that date they never looked back putting on a phenominal amount of growth. Even so it still looked as if we would miss our first show which was to have been the Glasgow Evergreen. Doubts were even raised whether or not anything would be ready for our own local show at Chryston which falls on the last Saturday in August. Glasgow Evergreen came and went, I only managed a few vases. It was the same story the following week at Chryston, very few blooms to choose from and I succeeded in qualifying for my first NAS. of the season. The remainder of the season was much better, that was my one and only NAS. in eleven shows. After Chryston show blooms came thick and fast but funnily enough they were all "perfect on Wednesday, never on a Friday night. Too much Kieserite? Or should I take the cuttings in the morning instead of the afternoon/evening? Thank goodness the National is a midweek show!
Very few blooms came oversize this year the exception being miniatures. I had learnt my lesson after last year's fiasco when 70% of blooms were oversize due to my over exhuberant disbudding. This year I was being more attentive and allowed the plants to grow rather rampantly in an attempt to keep bloom size down. Of course I overcompensated on some varieties especially smalls which turned out not much larger than miniatures. It is extremely difficult to comment on how the varieties and the new set-up performed this year due to the poor season. Generally speaking I was very well pleased with the layout. The only changes planned for next year will be to grow the plants under the canopy long ways instead of across the width of the tunnel. The reason for that is the fans were having difficulty in circulating the air between the rows and by changing the planting arrangement this will compliment the natural flow of air from West to East. The irrigation system worked great, the water being applied exactly where it should be and no soaking wet paths. The flow rate was adjusted to 100 gallons/hour, the plants being fed on Sunday and again on Wednesday with the appropriate Chempak fertiliser. The porous pipe certainly saves a lot of work, I would recommend it to anyone thinking about an automatic irrigation system. It is a low pressure system and can be run directly from a water butt or storage tank. The only stipulation is that the water needs to be filtered otherwise the inside of the pipe can become clogged up with minute particles. Both my filters were pretty well silted up come the end of the season even although they were flush cleaned weekly.
At the beginning of August I started partitioning off a section
of one of our old henhouses. Many moons ago we kept 6,000 hens
for egg production and two of the sheds still remain standing.
These houses are extremely well insulated and would be ideal for
propagating. Two benches were installed with the usual arrangement
of soil warming cables. Three mist irrigation heads are positioned
over the benches, these heads are controlled by a small box of
electronics. A sense head (electronic leaf) detects the state
of humidity above the cuttings. The sensitivity of the 'leaf'
can be controlled over a wide range of limits. The duration of
the mist burst period can be adjusted from two seconds to forty
seconds and the time delay between successive bursts can be varied
from between five minutes and one hour. Plenty of variables there
to play around with. too many perhaps. Lighting is supplied from
a Mercury lamp controlled from a time switch, day length is set
to twenty hours at the moment. Two tube heaters provide suplementary
heating if required. Up till now the problem has not been in maintaining
a constant 60 degrees but in keeping the temperature down. The
heat dissipated from the Mercury lamp is more than adequate to
heat the area which measures 18 feet by 10 feet. Recently I had
to incorporate a small ventilator to allow excess heat to escape.
At least the heating side of the system is very promising, even
on the coldest of frosty mornings
which we have had recently the temperature has remained around
the 62F mark with no additional heat being supplied from the tube
heaters. The complicated part of the equation is the misting system.
Throughout the latter part of the year I have been trying different
combinations of settings to establish the optimum. Limited success
to report at the moment. I don't know if it is more difficult
to root sideshoot growth compared to shoots taken from a tuber.
It would appear to be the case that it is more difficult. I have
started a few tubers off on the bench to give me some cuttings
to experiment with. This is being written on 20th November and
it all depends how much more time I have before the magazine goes
to press. Very few articles this year which is very disappointing,
currently I have 42 pages on disk and no more input is forthcoming.
Hence the reason for this long winded article. If the print date
is put back a few weeks I will have more information on how the
"mist house" is performing or not as the case may be.
Not having used a mist system before this whole exercise is a
step into the great unknown for me.
In the meantime Doug approached me to construct a suitable box to transport blooms across the Atlantic to Canada. Another interruption came in the shape of our National Show at Stirling. Just when I thought I was getting on fine I had to down tools and cut a few blooms for the show. We arrived at the Mayfield Centre at nine o'clock in the evening to find it a hive of activity. My goodness there were dozens of magnificient vases already on display. All I wanted to do was go home, however now that we were here it seemed a pity not to make some attempt at an entry. I had cut 18 Eastwood Moonlight and under the expert guidance of Robert Fulton selected the best five for Class 70 and another three were vased up for Class 71. Even now I don't think it has really sunk in.. .Best Vase and Second Best vase Mediums respectively. It is true after all, there is such a thing as 'beginner's luck" It is extremely difficult to quantify the high point of my year, whether it was winning the coveted 'blue rosette' or whether it was constructing Doug's box for the Canadian expedition. What started out a very late season for me turned out to be a blessing in disguise, all in all a most gratifying season except for the tomatoes, they were a disaster, no chutney this year.
It is now the 12th December and the magazine has been printed onto A4 paper in preparation for proof reading. Just time for a few more lines to fill up this empty page. After adjusting and re-adjusting the sensor and controls on the mist equipment and noting the result it would seem that the optimum settings that have been eluding me for the past three months are close at hand. It was a lot more difficult than I first thought. The cuttings are rooting in approximately 12 days, temperature is constant at 62 degrees and relative humidity 62% success rate is 90% with dahlias and 100% with chrysanthemums. I have read that other people achieve rooting in ten days or less but I cannot see me being able to achieve an average rooting time of under twelve days, time will tell however.
It is quite strange to see rooted cuttings in three inch pots in the middle of December. This system adds a new dimension to the hobby of growing and showing dahlias, hopefully it will allow me to keep my stock through the winter without needing to store tubers. As far as I am concerned the most difficult aspect of the hobby is over-wintering tubers. I don't know if anyone has mastered the art fully according to what I read in magazines. Another bonus is it gives me something to do while awaiting articles for 'Impact". Here is the good news... I have reached the end of the page, see you all around the shows. Good luck.