Dahlia Day

                                   Picture of last year's Dahlia's

Oh my Dahlia's! Or as I like to refer them as, my little high maintenance girlfriends! High maintenance? Oh yes. I dug them up in November. Hosed them off. Divided them. Hand dipped every bulb (I'm talking hundreds) in fungicide. Laid them each tenderly in a giant tupperware with shredded paper to keep from molding. And now, 4 months later, I am tenderly awakening these sleeping beauties and I planted almost all of them in the dirt yesterday. But not after churning each bed, adding compost dirt, bone and blood meal, and organic fertilizer. Soon they will need stakes and string to keep them tall and strong. The addition of the acre lot this year allowed me to experiment with a future dahlia farm! My friend Jan gave me about 12 new species of dahlias. My favorites being named "I'm a hottie" and "Touche".  I am experimenting with Mother Nature this season. I tend to plant my dahlias right in the middle of our rainy season. So I waited 2 months later to try skipping this misty time frame. We'll see! I tricked the tubers into a false winter which is why I dug them up. I might need to eventually invest in a bulb chiller. In 3 months I should start seeing blooms!