I have only been growing Dahlias for five years and still consider
myself a novice.
A few of my learned Dahlia growing friends asked me to put pen
to paper and write an article for the magazine describing the
method I use to grow small cactus dahlias particularly the Kiwi
family.
I should explain the heading of this piece. When I started exhibiting
dahlias the small cactus Kiwi Gloria was enjoying spectacular
success on the show benches. On asking advice on how it should
be grown, I was told “forget it”, “it will not
do in Scotland, it is an Englishman’s flower”.
I selected my garden before the house (no kidding), a south facing
plot on top of a hill. I have to use Poly-Tunnels because any
plant life above 6 inches is scythed down by everyday gales. I
even go to bed with wearing my bunnet.
I prefer raised beds as the soil warms up quicker, and have three
beds 22 feet long by 4 feet wide. The soil was very poor, blue
clay in fact which would not do for the Kiwi family. This is when
the madness started. I decided to dump the poor soil, dug to a
depth of 18 inches and brought 30 Tonnes of decent loam from my
last garden.
Still not content with that amount of work, I built a Table Riddle
and began to fill the Beds with a mix of 4 parts soil, 4 parts
peat and 2 parts Sharp sand.
That lot took me a week from dawn till dusk, well I ask you, what
else can you do with a week off from work in November. My employer
should not give me holidays. I dread to think what I will get
up to when I retire.
I set the tubers on soil warming cables in the first week of March,
and usually have enough cuttings by the second or third week in
April.
I prefer to use Plant Pak 24 cells for rooting, the mix being
equal parts Peat and Perlite. The propagator is set for a bottom
heat of 65 F, (I don’t know what that is in new money) and
the Paks are normally full of root in about 14 days, then they
are moved to five inch pots containing a mix of 80% Peat and 20%
Perlite.
The Peat I use is from Grow-bags and I also put one inch of well-rotted
dung in the bottom of the pot. After a week or so they are transferred
into the Tunnel to acclimatise themselves.
About 10 days before planting, I dress the Beds with a potato
fertiliser, it is the cheapest as I get it for nothing!
I only plant out the dahlias when the soil temperature reaches
50F whether that is the first or the second week of June. This
is the benefit of the five inch pots and the one inch of dung,
it can buy me time until the 50F temperature is reached.
I plant the Dahlias 2 feet apart with 2 feet between each row.
20 Gloria, 20 Deborah’s and 20 Trelyn’s, give them a
good soaking with lukewarm water, then leave them for around three
weeks to establish a large root system.
The growth is visible daily because of the constant temperature
of around 60-70 F.
My Stopping Dates are 5th June for Kiwi Gloria, 12th June for
Deborah’s Kiwi and 17th June for Trelyn’s Kiwi.
I spray every week for Greenfly whether I see them or not, alternating
between Polysect and Tumblebug.
This is where the madness comes back again. I reduce the breaks
in the first week in August to 6. That is 6 / 6 / 6 for all the
Kiwi family.
“It is a devil of a hobby this” I can hear the cries.
“Now HE should be in the Psychiatric Hospital instead of
being employed there”. I have tried 9 / 8 / 7 up but could
not get the quality I was after. I think the reason is due to
the moisture content or lack of it. There is no way that I can
replace natural rainfall in a fixed tunnel.
I remove all foliage from the base of the plants once the breaks
have been selected and feed weekly with High Potash usually Phostrogen,
once again the water is lukewarm. I try to be as accurate as possible
with this feed giving each plant two pints.
The plants will not tolerate cold soil, or wet and windy weather,
they really have to be mollycoddled and given tender loving care.
Yvonne sums it up when she says “I think you love those Dallies
more than me” and for the sake of harmony, I will let my
learned Dahlia Growers answer that question.