Dazzling dahlias
For brilliant autumnal colour that can last into November, you can’t do better than these beautiful blooms
YOU’VE got to hand it to dahlias – when most other plants in your beds and borders shut up shop for the winter, these late-summer stalwarts are still battling to produce their blooms.
So obliging are they that they’ll carry on doing so until stopped in their tracks by the first severe frosts – but in many years that can be as late as early November.
Of course, the blooms might not be produced in quite such rapid succession as they were in midsummer, but at this time of year gardeners are grateful for any display that gives a last hint of summer colour.
To keep them going for as long as possible, make sure you continue to deadhead – allowing new blooms to stand out among the foliage. The cooler weather will do little to discourage earwigs. They love to nibble on dahlia flowers. The oldest way of capturing them is still effective.
Push 5ft canes among the plants and, on top of each one, invert a small terracotta flower pot stuffed with straw. These upturned flowerpots offer perfect accommodation for your average earwig, which will be only too happy to sneak in and snuggle down. Empty the pots every few days and you will go some way to controlling the earwig population.
Years ago we always used to dig up our dahlia tubers after the leaves had been blackened by frost and dry them off before storing them for winter in trays of dryish sand.
Then it was discovered that a 3-4in mulch of manure around the
plants in autumn would often see them through the winter, the old growth being cut down and new shoots emerging in spring. In colder parts of Britain, though, you will have to decide whether to leave them in or dig them up.
Either way, don’t do without dahlias in your garden. They are one of our greatest late-summer delights.