Hello friends,

As part of my dahlia growing experiments this year, one of my goals is to grow my own dahlia plants from seed. I have a stash of dahlia seed available, including the Bee's Choice dahlia variety from Floret in the USA (which I bought from Emerden last year), Beeline I and II dahlia seeds from the breeder Doctor Keith Hammett in New Zealand, dahlia seeds from Susie Ripley's garden in Dunedin, and also open pollinated seeds from my own garden.

At the end of August, once I was able to garden again after my second cataract surgery, I sowed my dahlia seeds into two covered seed trays, and sprinkled them with enough seed raising mix to cover them.

With them watered, and kept moist in the trays, the dahlia seeds stayed in our dining room in the warmth while they germinated. To my surprise, most of the dahlia seeds I planted germinated, at a rate of about 95%, which is way more dahlias than I expected to plant in my garden this year.

They grew nice and strong, and soon they were ready to transplant out into bigger pots with potting mix. They've been growing safe and sound in my glasshouse since then, growing bigger each week. My plan is to plant them in the garden after the last frost, but for now I have to figure out where I'm going to put 43 dahlia seedlings...

I can't wait to see what dahlia flowers appear from these seedlings over the summer. My plan is to be quite harsh with them, and I'll pull out any flowering plant that I'm not happy with, to give other dahlias room to grow. I'll give you updates as I go...

Have a wonderful day

Julie-Ann

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Tags: 2025, Dahlia, Dahlia Seedlings, Dahlias, Floret, Floret Flower Farm, Flower Garden, Flowers, Garden, Garden Project, Gardening, Seed, Seed Saving, Seed Sowing, Seedlings, Seeds, Self-Seeded, Spring