Briggs is defending against squirrels and neighbors, while I battle an equally nefarious enemy -- laziness.
I have a dozen dahlias in my garden, and I love them. But, digging, separating and treating them has become a difficult and time consuming chore, taking two or three full days of precious gardening time. And worse, this year I just didn't feel like doing it.
So I must wrap myself in the holy mantle of science and do an experiment. Theorem: One can leave his dahlias in the ground over the mild San Francisco winter and still have a huge floriferous summer of blooms.
Test Description:
(a) 6 dahlias get left in the ground
(b) 4 dahlias get dug up, separated, and then immediately re-planted
(c) 3 new dahlias get to strut their stuff
(b) is the truly heretical position. Usually in San Francisco, dahlias are separated, treated with a variety of anti-fungal agents, stored carefully until May or so, then re-planted. This week-end I just took the most promising tubers/crowns and dropped them back in the ground.
Total gardening time: 3 hours.
In about a month I will fertilize the heck out of everything, and then we'll see how things grow. Over the summer I'll report on progress.
Posted by rich at February 27, 2006 4:50 PMwell, thank the gods somebody is using scientific method; and i have to admit that the Frankel Method of gardening results in a majestic bloomfest in an orderly and visually compelling front yard (we won't mention the back). Whereas the decidedly unmethodical Nisbet Nuance gardening style produces chaotic and unruly compositions that are accidentally charming at times....
Posted by: briggs on February 28, 2006 11:21 AMI live at 1700 feet in the Santa Cruz Mountains, and the dahlias I planted in a raised bed were fine the first year, and became monsters the second, without any intervention of any sort from me. This year they are still sleeping in the beds, but will be aroused to be split up and moved out of the raised beds to the bank, where the gophers and voles (and rabbits of course) may get them. I almost don't care. They were overwhelming last year.
Posted by: Nancy on March 2, 2006 8:28 AM