January 2012

It seems no time at all since I began this occasional offering about growing dahlias generally targeting those of you that are new to these magnificent plants.  But is is a year now so to find out what to do with your dahlias in January please look back to the very first post!

December is a quiet month for the commercial grower, although these terms are relative!    During December I was interviewed as a contributor for an article for Flower Arranger magazine edited by Judith Blacklock.  This magazine is the standard journal of all flower clubs nationwide and promotes the use of British Blooms.  

2011 was a fantastic year for us as it was the first year of serious, commercial operations.  We established a link with a top wholesaler in New Covent Garden Flower Market, Alagar Limited, and through them reached top designers such as Simon Lycett of "Four Weddings and a Funeral" fame who took our blooms on to the "Alan Titchmarsh Show" and Shane Connolly who designed the arrangements in Westminster Abbey for the wedding of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.  They both became firm and valued customers in 2011 and we look forward to supplying them once again this year.  Twice a week from August to the middle of October we transported our few hundred blooms in buckets to the market in the 4x4 and then parked between huge pantechnicons, with trailers, from the Netherlands!

We were visited by a number of photographers Helen Jermyn being the notable guest, Helen was kind enough to write a nice blog article about us back in August.   

As for trial and tribulations; we learnt never to use Royal Mail for sending our plants.  In 2011 we used Royal Mail for delivering rooted cuttings but 30% of the packages we sent were either lost or damaged.  The fact that we were fully compensated by them is of no real value as we not only needed to find replacements but the time and effort required was time we could have spent more productively!   We sent all our plants - 'garden ready' so to speak, that is, matured plants ex-9cm pots - using City Link courier with a 100% success rate.  As a consequence, for 2012 we are only offering plants and not rooted cuttings.  These will be available from mid-April onwards for people with greenhouse facilities and later until the first week in June for those without greenhouses.

Looking forward; July 27th is the start of the 2012 London Olympics, I do hope that the florists selected to provide the arrangements and bouquets buy British!

Dahlia jobs in September

September is a month when the jobs are a continuation of August; keep feeding and well watered until the end of the month as necessary.
Keep dis-budding as required and maintain the dead-heading; this will stimulate and speed up the growth of more flowering side shoots.
Make sure all plants are labelled while in flower!  It is so easy to forget and identification when frosted is difficult.  Keep the routing hygiene going and stay on the look-out for the dreaded insects; wasps, earwigs and caterpillars.
If you have the opportunity do visit dahlia nurseries to see exactly how the different cultivars grow in terms of height and habit.

We've had a terrific August as we are now supplying New Covent Garden Flower Market with blooms twice a week and am getting great feedback from both the market and the market customers.  When we scaled the operation up there was always that doubt that we would not be able to get all the blooms to the consumer, through New Covent Garden we are.  The real barrier for British cut flower growers is getting the florist trade and consumer to insist, where possible, on British grown cut flowers.

£2.2 billion is spent on flowers in this country, that is more that the music industry, over 85% are imported.  Flowers are flown in from Africa, South America and Asia; just think what that does to the UK carbon footprint!  Not only that but it has over the past 20 years as imports have risen, put many British growers out of business.  However, do not expect British cut flowers to be cheaper because they are British!  But you do get a quality product that is supporting the local horticultural industry and it will, over time, reduce the carbon footprint.