Dahlias: Better late than never, 1 by psudan

psudan wrote:
Hi pirl, Thanks for asking about me. I haven't had a chance to get on the forums lately and haven't had much luck with the dahlias until recently. After the torrential rain last year, this year was BONE dry. Every storm headed our way either died before it got here or split and went north and south of us. We had many days in the 90's. I planted the tubers at the end of May and watered sparingly. Even with the dry weather I still lost 9 or 10 to rot. The growth was painfully slow and at the end of July I had many that were only 6"- 8" tall. In mid-August I decided they were either going to sink or swim. I got out the hose and literally drowned then. As a result they took off and I've had more growth in the last 3 weeks than I had in the first 10 weeks. Over half have bloomed or budded and I'm hoping for more before frost. This one is Hollyhill Starburst.