Many of us love this beautiful flower, but not everyone knows whether it is necessary to excavate tubers of dahlias for the winter, when it should be done and how to store them properly.
One of the main conditions for the successful winter storage of dahlia tubers is the choice of the right time for their digging. It should be remembered that it is unacceptable to unnecessarily fertilize these plants at the end of the growing season .
Tubers in many varieties of dahlias begin to form in the spring, but their final ripening occurs only at the end of the season. Therefore, the longer the flower tubers are in the ground, the better they will form, and, therefore, will be more successfully stored in winter.
In many places at the end of summer there are light frosts, in which the flowers are dahlias and leaves.
Affected areas of such plants after small frosts must be cut off, and soon they will rejoice you with their flowering, and the tubers will ripen right up to the present frosts. At this time, it is necessary to cut off all the lower leaves of the plant - this will promote the early ripening of the dahlia tubers. It is also necessary to take care of the root system of the flower. During the summer, watering and raining bare the root neck of the plant, so dahlias should be bored to ensure that their roots are well protected by earth.
After the first severe frost occurs, the dahlia bushes immediately turn black. That's when the time comes to dig their tubers, and it should be done within three days, so as not to allow sleeping buds to wake up.
Dug up the tubers of dahlias
Before you start harvesting the dahlias for the winter, you need to remove all diseased, weakened and weakly flowering plants from the site. Pay special attention to the sick flowers: they should be dug together with a clod of earth and burned.
Some believe that a few days before the excavation of tubers must cut off from the plants all the stems. However, in this case, the root of the stalk of dahlia may rot while the moisture gets on it. If you dig out dahlias using this method, be sure to cover the sections of the stems with aluminum foil. Cutting the stem, leave a piece of about 8-10 cm above the ground to facilitate further work with the tuber. After the stem is cut, do not forget to hang a biogame with the name of a variety of dahlias.
When digging bulbs of dahlias, the work should be done carefully and carefully, since the neck of the tuber is very fragile, especially immediately after it was removed from the ground. It is better to start work in the morning, and after digging leave the tubers for several hours to dry, then they will not be so fragile.
To successfully extract a tuber of dahlia from the ground, it is necessary to dig it at a distance of about 30 cm from the stem. Thus, the roots will be cut off, and the tubers will remain intact. Do not pull for the remainder of the stem, because it can be damaged. Carefully remove the clods of soil from the tubers and, turning them upside down, leave for a short while to dry. Then you need to wash the tubers from the ground under the stream of water. This will secure them in case of further storage, as in earth residues
Now we place clean tubers for 5-6 days in a damp and cold room, for example, on a veranda or in a cellar. Be sure to monitor the temperature of the air, not allowing the freezing of tubers. At this time on the tubers there is a so-called cauterization of the skin, which subsequently protects them from loss of moisture.
Sometimes gardeners are interested in whether it is possible at all to dig out dahlias for the winter. The generally accepted opinion is that they must be dug out, otherwise the tubers will freeze in the winter and no warming will help in this case.