I am not totally sure if this belongs here but we’ll see. Please bear with me as this will be a bit to explain.
I planted a bunch of Mignon Single Mix (mixed color seed packet) Dahlias - under the impression that they were annuals - in my flower beds with my perennials so that I’d have some blooms this year. I bought the seeds from an online seed vendor and the description said that they were annuals as well as smaller annuals. I also planted some perennial dahlias that were already bloomed that I got online.
I am experienced with organic vegetable and fruit gardening but this is my first year planting any flowers with the exception of flowering herbs and sunflowers. I have bearded dragons and discovered that some flowers were edible for them; with their near refusal to eat their salads I got the idea that maybe some colored flower toppers may make their salads more attractive to them - they love bright colors.
When the single mixed dahlias first started blooming I was really impressed. They were a lot bigger than the pictures made them appear and also the colors were really pretty however, they ended up having a much bigger spread and being much taller than described. To my surprise they also (I believe) were cross pollinated with the perennial dahlias so after a couple months of being flowers with only one single row of petals, they started growing blooms with multiple rows which are really gorgeous. I’m not sure the picture limit on these posts but I will try to post as many pictures as possible describing the few things I am explaining.
The past two days we have had an absolutely absurd amount of heavy rain and very strong winds. I was already having a rough time keeping everything clean and looking organized because space became an issue with them ending up much larger than anticipated. Today we woke up to a lot of them totally flipped onto their sides. We have a raised garden bed for the flowers lining the front and half of the side of our house. Most of them were hanging over the edge, touching the ground, spread out and pushed over exposing the stems where they go into the ground.
I decided to just start pulling some of them to create some space. Now here is my *kind of* “issue.” I pulled one of the pink colored ones out and nothing looked special or perennial about the roots - fine. Then I tried to pull the next and the plant broke off right at the soil; my husband was there and offered to go grab the shovel to dig the roots out. By the time he got back I was moving on to the next one I was going to pull and at about the same time I pull those, he digs the roots out of the other one and what we both got out of the ground was one plant with really nice healthy tuberous roots and he dug up the same.
I stopped immediately and looked with confusion. I know this is my first year with flowers but if these have tubers, doesn’t that mean they are perennials? They look exactly like the dahlia tubers that you buy in stores. I’m at a place where I’m thinking this is great because I can now keep the tubers if a few colors that I really like in the ground or replant them more spaced out and have them next year with my other perennials, especially the ones that now have multiple rows of petals. Also though, I’m thinking there is no way these are perennials. That digging up and replanting the tubers shouldn’t yield anything because these are supposed to be annuals.
So basically, I am just wondering if anyone has any experience with these specific dahlias and can tell me what they actually are. Whether they are annuals or perennials. Whether or not cutting the stems back to the soil or digging up and moving tubers to more desirable spacing/places would give me more flowers next year.
Going to try to post pictures of what the wind/rain did to them (not really sure that it will help anything but it gives you an idea of how big/congested things ended up as a result of them being advertised as smaller annuals) , the original flowers with single rows of petals vs what are now starting to bloom with multiple rows, the dahlias that are classic perennial dahlias that I bought already blooming (you can see the difference between what I knew are perennials and what I was told were annuals), as well as the tuberous roots he dug up out of the ground and the ones I pulled up with an entire plant.
I planted a bunch of Mignon Single Mix (mixed color seed packet) Dahlias - under the impression that they were annuals - in my flower beds with my perennials so that I’d have some blooms this year. I bought the seeds from an online seed vendor and the description said that they were annuals as well as smaller annuals. I also planted some perennial dahlias that were already bloomed that I got online.
I am experienced with organic vegetable and fruit gardening but this is my first year planting any flowers with the exception of flowering herbs and sunflowers. I have bearded dragons and discovered that some flowers were edible for them; with their near refusal to eat their salads I got the idea that maybe some colored flower toppers may make their salads more attractive to them - they love bright colors.
When the single mixed dahlias first started blooming I was really impressed. They were a lot bigger than the pictures made them appear and also the colors were really pretty however, they ended up having a much bigger spread and being much taller than described. To my surprise they also (I believe) were cross pollinated with the perennial dahlias so after a couple months of being flowers with only one single row of petals, they started growing blooms with multiple rows which are really gorgeous. I’m not sure the picture limit on these posts but I will try to post as many pictures as possible describing the few things I am explaining.
The past two days we have had an absolutely absurd amount of heavy rain and very strong winds. I was already having a rough time keeping everything clean and looking organized because space became an issue with them ending up much larger than anticipated. Today we woke up to a lot of them totally flipped onto their sides. We have a raised garden bed for the flowers lining the front and half of the side of our house. Most of them were hanging over the edge, touching the ground, spread out and pushed over exposing the stems where they go into the ground.
I decided to just start pulling some of them to create some space. Now here is my *kind of* “issue.” I pulled one of the pink colored ones out and nothing looked special or perennial about the roots - fine. Then I tried to pull the next and the plant broke off right at the soil; my husband was there and offered to go grab the shovel to dig the roots out. By the time he got back I was moving on to the next one I was going to pull and at about the same time I pull those, he digs the roots out of the other one and what we both got out of the ground was one plant with really nice healthy tuberous roots and he dug up the same.
I stopped immediately and looked with confusion. I know this is my first year with flowers but if these have tubers, doesn’t that mean they are perennials? They look exactly like the dahlia tubers that you buy in stores. I’m at a place where I’m thinking this is great because I can now keep the tubers if a few colors that I really like in the ground or replant them more spaced out and have them next year with my other perennials, especially the ones that now have multiple rows of petals. Also though, I’m thinking there is no way these are perennials. That digging up and replanting the tubers shouldn’t yield anything because these are supposed to be annuals.
So basically, I am just wondering if anyone has any experience with these specific dahlias and can tell me what they actually are. Whether they are annuals or perennials. Whether or not cutting the stems back to the soil or digging up and moving tubers to more desirable spacing/places would give me more flowers next year.
Going to try to post pictures of what the wind/rain did to them (not really sure that it will help anything but it gives you an idea of how big/congested things ended up as a result of them being advertised as smaller annuals) , the original flowers with single rows of petals vs what are now starting to bloom with multiple rows, the dahlias that are classic perennial dahlias that I bought already blooming (you can see the difference between what I knew are perennials and what I was told were annuals), as well as the tuberous roots he dug up out of the ground and the ones I pulled up with an entire plant.
