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What's the best way to plant a dahlia
Nikki B
Posts: 90
Hello, I bought this today from tesco and as I'm a complete novice on gardening I wondered if anyone had any tips on planting it please, as the tesco leaflet says the same on every plant I have brought ! my soil is like clay but im moving a load of top soil on top of it and planting bedding plants and plants that are coming throug the topsoil which has been a few now any help on this i would really appreciate
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Posts
Best thing to add to clay soil is some sharp sand and mix it in well. Over time this will create small gaps in the clay structure and allow the roots to penetrate further down into moist soil. Worked for me even if the 50kg bag of sand was rather heavy. That was enough sand for a 5m x 1m border.
Great thank you I've a sack of sharpe sand in the garden I will do that tomorrow
This is only partly true unfortunately. You need to get air into the clay and improve the drainage so water can run through it. Lots of organic fibrous material will hold the clay particles apart. Sand and grit acts a bit like putting stones in cement unless you have organic with it to trap air around the grit. Just mulching (covering) the soil with compost works, over time, because worms will take into the soil, but life is usually too short so you have to mix it in too. The sharper and larger the grit the better. Don't use shingle, i.e. round pebbles.
What works for me with dahlias on my slowly improving clay soil is to dig out a fairly large hole, perhaps twice as deep and twice as wide as the pot your dahlia is in. Remove any large stones and weeds at the same time.
Then add some compost to the bottom of the hole and also mix some compost in with the soil you have dug out (roughly 50% of each) which you will use to back fill and plant your dahlia into that. You could also add a bit of slow release fertilizer into the hole at the same time. After planting, water the dahlia in well.
I've found in my clay soil that dahlia tubers have to be lifted at the end of the growing season as they rot off otherwise and then they can be replanted next year.
Thank you everyone for being so helpful