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Overview
Sown now in the greenhouse, dahlia seeds will produce young plants ready to plant outdoors in late May to flower this year. Seed companies sell a range of quick-growing bedding strains that are suitable for growing this way. You can also use this method for sowing seeds saved from your own dahlia plants at the end of the previous season.
Do it:
February - mid-March
At its best:
late-August - early-October
Takes just:
20 minutes
How to do it
-
Fill a pot or seed tray with moist multi-purpose compost and lightly firm the surface. Sow dahlia seeds on the surface and push them gently into the compost. Don't forget to label your seeds. -
Cover pots with an inflated clear polythene bag, held in place with a rubber band. If sown in seed trays, cover with a propagator lid. The seedlings are ready to pot up singly when the second pair of leaves appear (as shown). -
By mid May the young plants will be ready to go outside. Harden them off for a week by standing them outdoors during the day and bringing them indoors at night. They can then be planted out in their flowering positions in the garden.
"Allow a few dahlia flowers to set seed for collection at the end of September. Save them in an envelope over winter to sow in February. You'll get a wonderful mixture of different flower shapes and colours from the resulting plants."
Comments and rating
Overall rating (from 5 ratings):
Hi i don't have a green house can i keep them in the house. I do have covered shelves outside that has been usefull in the summer, is it still to cold to use that?
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4 out of 5
4 out of 5
i THINK i'LL GIVE THIS A TRY.
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5 out of 5
love seeing all the new things from gardeners world, shame some of us haven't got enough room in our gardens to try every thing out, at the moment I am still struggling to get things under control after the winter and my garden is smothered in ground elder as my neighbours think it's ground cover and leave it to romp all over the place. my peonies are comming up nicely though even though they have to put up with heavy clay,
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4 out of 5
enjoy all these little tit bits of information.
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jogriff rated and commented on this article
31 January 2009
4 out of 5
In this current financial climate I am having to cut back on heating the greenhouse, am now just keeping it to 'frost-free'. Will this impact on when I can start sowing my annuals, eg. lobelia, and any other perennial variety seeds?
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