Favorite new-to-me dahlias I grew this year.
These are just the dahlias that I am growing for the first time… You can see my full flower order and last year’s favorites in my earlier dahlia post. I am leaving out anything I’m not happy with or that isn’t performing well.
Overall I like a pink/yellow color scheme with some purple/orange for variety and contrast… But sometimes I get distracted and start thinking I need extra variety. Which is always a mistake— I am someone who needs no variety at all.
I took these pictures over the weekend. It’s my favorite thing about dahlias– everything else is dying back and they are just getting started.
I grow my dahlias in tomato cages… not too pretty for the first two months, but saves me staking-duty. Plus, tomato cages are worthless for actual tomatoes, so you can sometimes find them on trash night.
I’ll write the flower/my impression above, then share the photo below.
Oregon Reign is nice. I like the streaky petals, and the blooms are pretty large… you could compare it to a smaller version of Vassio Meggos.
Bluetiful is very pretty. But it did not get very tall for me. I have two and they are both hidden by larger plants… next year I will be sure to plant these tubers at the front of the bed.
Both have nice full foliage and blooms in the purple/lavender family… (although I think “blue”tiful is a stretch.)
Heather Feather and Innocence are similar. (Innocence is lighter.) Both very pretty flowers, sort of similar to Randi Dawn, (second photo in that link– it’s my favorite waterlily dahlia.)
I like the more intense pink of Heather Feather, but Innocence is giving me bigger/more flowers, and is a bigger plant overall.
Daydreamer is one of the best new dahlias I tried. It was the first to sprout and bloom and it has a great waterlily shape… It’s a nice size flower and the more intense initial color fades to a light yellow but it doesn’t look tired.
Nicholas has stems that are not super long, so you end up with some flowers pretty much inside the plant, but the color is a great peachy-orange, not a light red or muddy yellow, and the flowers are large.
Both have very full foliage and lots of blooms.
Sheer Heaven is light peachy-yellow, less-intense than Daydreamer. Nice foliage and blooms.
Cameo Peach is a pretty flower, but for some reason I do not find it remarkable one way or another.
Blah Blah Blah is a color combination of rose and dusky yellow. I thought the colors would seem kind of vintage-y and cottage-garden-ish, and they do upon close inspection (or in photos) but from a few feet away, it is… blah (which I guess they tried to tell me)… the flower/color doesn’t pop out. Plus, it is small. But it’s made a really nice cut flower– great long stems and good vase life.
Gabriel Marie is a replacement tuber that I did not choose. (Some tubers will not sprout, and then you need to get a replacement… and by the time you realize this, they might be sold out of the one you ordered, and then they just send you whatever they have.) This rarely ends up in a flower I like, but Gabriel Marie is one I’ll order again.
It is a very prolific bloomer. Not too tall, but lots of plant. It has almost a sunset look to it – the center is very dark orange, but the surrounding petals are more yellow.
I received some other replacements, none of which are worth writing about… and I grew some others that I don’t love, so didn’t bother taking pictures.
For instance, I ordered Boogie Nights– because I love the movie of the same name**— and surprisingly it turns out that is not a good way to pick flowers… it is too dark, the flowers are small, and the plant isn’t very full (although it is a dahlia, so it’s possible that if I moved it five inches to the left it would explode with amazing size and vitality.)
**I am compelled to specify that I am not endorsing the movie… unless you like deliberately tacky, retro, and naked Marky Mark. Which I do.
If they made a Magic Mike dahlia, I’d order that too.
August 26, 2014 @ 10:10 am
You may convert me to dahlias… right now flowers are a little sparse other than roses (second bloom flush), trumpet vine, hardy fuscias, stella d’oro day lilies and clematis. Okay, I may have to deliberately kill something to plant them but those big knock-out blooms are worth it!
August 26, 2014 @ 10:11 am
You do know you’re hooking thousands of us on dahlias, right? You know this, right? So far I’m now looking for Innocence and Oregon Marie in addition to the ones I fell in love with from your last dahlia post. Thank-you for getting me hooked – how do you feel about peonies:)
August 26, 2014 @ 10:17 am
I love them, EXCEPT it invariably POURS the same day they reach ultimate full-bloom… and I have to either sit out there with an umbrella or accept that weather is a part of gardening.
August 26, 2014 @ 10:11 am
Gorgeous!
August 26, 2014 @ 10:23 am
Oh, I love me some dahlias. I used to order a purple variety called Jean Marie from the Dutch Gardens catalog… my daughter Jean thought they were named for her! Huge blooms! But now I am converting my garden to native prairie flowers so no more dahlias. Gosh, your photos are close to tempting me to plant some next year, though!
August 26, 2014 @ 10:29 am
Are you going to dig them up and put them someplace cool and dry? That is my biggest challenge — living in an area whereby I have to dig up bulbs that I love. Invariably the bulbs end up looking like scabs — then I have to start over. I ended up not getting beautiful bulbs. Let us know if you find a way of digging them up and storing them.
August 26, 2014 @ 10:30 am
I would not have voted that you would be a good gardener but I am flabbergasted at the knowledge and know how. Bravo!
Where I live, the village of East Hampton, deer (you read right DEER) now stroll the village streets as if they are hedge fund owners or hedges as they are known. The deer eat every flower in their path. They ate all of the azaleas. They ate the blossoms off of all the host plants. They ate about a hundred day lilies before they had a chance to bloom. The deer are now so brazen they will stare at you as they finish chewing your flowers. They stare at me.
August 26, 2014 @ 11:50 am
Are you sure you don’t live in Bloomington, IN? Your deer sound like ours. Bloomington is a misnomer — the deer eat them all.
August 26, 2014 @ 10:34 am
Your dahlias are beautiful! Do you dig up the tubers each year? (I liked Boogie Nights too – just wish the actors kept there clothes on – but I guess that would not have worked given the subject matter)
August 26, 2014 @ 10:36 am
Lovely! Flowers I am coming to love are the old English garden style. Delphiniums, Foxglove, Daisy (there are some really elegant daisies), Hollyhocks and Rudbeckia (so many designer types now). I like daylilies too, and intersperse the orange with some purple tall phlox, makes a nice contrast.
My climate demands I bring in tenders like dahlia, so as much as I admire them I’ll pass; I’m a lazy gardener. I do so very much enjoy your posts, and seeing your lovely dahlias. 🙂
August 26, 2014 @ 10:52 am
I am sold on Dahlias! Oh my gosh. The Daydreamer and Nicholas are gorgeous. I can’t wait to buy bulbs!
August 26, 2014 @ 11:12 am
Soooo jealous. Gorgeous flowers. I too have a deer problem. They ate all 135 of my hosta plants! And I have never seen my hydrangeas in bloom because they eat every stinking flower. I gave up….nothing but liropes.
August 26, 2014 @ 11:13 am
I love the gabrielle Marie, what a pretty, vibrant affect it has. I bought a bunch of tubers and seeds etc. from Johnnies Seeds ( I think that’s the name?) but they are still sitting in a drawer from last year. It’s not for want of making the effort but the myriad problems I have with the other plants I’m trying to keep alive has discouraged me from planting anything else. I keep meaning to ask one of the local master gardeners to take a look @ my dilemmas next time she is in Brandermill but so far I am perfecting my procrastination skills to an absolute state of inertia and so just haven’t had a spare moment.
August 26, 2014 @ 11:34 am
Every year, after reading your post on growing dahlias, I promise myself I’ll try these beauties. Every year I fail to take action. At least I can enjoy them online, which is way easier than the work involved in growing them. Thank you for this. 🙂
xo
August 26, 2014 @ 11:39 am
I can’t grow dahlias. The gophers love to eat them here. And they come in force! Oddly, gophers are also protected by the state, so I can’t murder with impunity.
August 26, 2014 @ 6:12 pm
Have you tried gopher stakes? that is what I use in my garden. They are plastic stakes that beeps every few minutes and the gophers hate it. You can barely hear the beeps yourself because they are in the ground. You only need to change the batteries once per year, I use one on each side of my garden.
August 26, 2014 @ 11:43 am
Lovely! I bought a pack of dahlia bulbs to plant earlier this year, but instead I thought It’d be more fun to put them in my mud room and forget about them for months until it was way too late to plant and the bulbs were dried up husks.
August 26, 2014 @ 12:00 pm
My faves are Oregon Reign (I like the pointed petals better than the round ones), and then Nicholas and Gabrielle Marie (now that’s a gorgeous colour). Personally, I cannot mix yellow with pink, especially the lighter shades, but that’s just me.
Your dahlias are beautiful. I wish I had any space to plant them but I don’t.
August 26, 2014 @ 12:20 pm
No dahlias, though they are quite gorgeous! I have a lot of vintage flowers given to me by an older couple, who had long since forgotten their names. I try, every so often, to find out what one or two are called, but mostly, I just enjoy them. I have made up names for some of them, based on their appearance.
This year’s garden has suffered immensely from weed growth. I have had neither the time, inclination, or stamina to fight them. I actually purchased some annuals (something I RARELY do), and they are still sitting in the same spot where I put them upon returning home with them, three months ago. I do, at least, water them occasionally!
I got a bunch of seeds from my brother-in-law (he has an amazing green thumb), and hope I have more umpff and less procrastination next year. Peonies are some of the seeds. His blooms get to dinner plate size! He has to stake them, or grow in tomato cages, because the stems simply can’t support such huge blooms. Got some cuttings for white, purple and dark purple butterfly bushes. His bushes are all as big as a car! Thousands of spiky bloom heads attract a myriad of butterflies, and hummingbirds, as well. If they turn out half as nice as your dahlias, I’ll be satisfied.
August 26, 2014 @ 1:16 pm
<3 <3 <3 !
but…
how long do the blooms last? i often fall in love with photos of plants only to discover they look that nice for about 2 weeks, after a long spell of being unremarkable, and then they wither into brown dead masses which deface the garden half the year. so i'm being more cautious these days about growing smitten with plants, and asking such questions first.
August 26, 2014 @ 1:33 pm
Quite a few years ago I got the bright idea of growing small dahlias from seeds. When the seedlings were mature enough to transfer I placed them in paper cups. I was up until 2 a.m. transferring these little rascals and ended up with around 300 paper cups sitting around the house. Later I planted them around my brick patio & wow, I had the prettiest flowers you have ever seen. Everyone commented on how beautiful they were. Since then I only buy the tubers from the nursery. Dahlias are one of my favorite flowers.
August 26, 2014 @ 1:46 pm
These are beautiful!
I love dahlias but not the earwigs that they seem to attract.When I have grown them in the past I would cut some of the blooms, arrange them in a beautiful centerpiece, and just as guests were seated around the table….The Great Earwig Exodus began! Yuck 🙁
Yours look too beautiful to be harboring the disgusting earwig. And I like the tomato cage idea as I also found them to be worthless with the tomato plants.
August 26, 2014 @ 5:23 pm
I have found a trick to get rid of earwigs, thought I’d share if you want to try growing dahlias again. I fill a little plastic container (with straight sides, so they can climb) with the cheapest oïl I can find, and just leave it in the grass. The little pests go drown in the oïl, you may have to empty and refill the container more than once. The first year I caught about 200 , the second 50 and I have not seen one earwig this year !
August 26, 2014 @ 5:17 pm
Glorious glorious flowers VEB! Because of your previous dahlia posts I was inspired to grow my own this year. Sorry for lack of pic but believe me when I say they were almost 3feet tall and huge like a tea saucer. Mine were a pretty pretty pink. I am growing more next year.
Love love love your blog! You make my day!