I'd won this class for the past two years but despite staging 3 cracking sets of veg and good vase of flowers I had to be content with 3rd place out of 3! No shame in losing out to two first rate displays however. My veg were Kestrel spuds, Vento onions and Cedrico tomatoes along with a vase of Mary's Jomanda.
2 comments:
Great results yet again, you will have to tell us how you grow and show your dahlias, I tried showing them this year and came well last. Are you going National next week with your parsnips.
To be honest James, I don't give my dahlias any great attention apart from making sure they're well staked before they get too high. All this talk of debranching etc is beyond me.
Make sure the side buds are nipped out as soon as you can and I give them a potash feed as soon as they start to show colour.
Earwigs and caterpillars can be a problem so you have to inspect daily to make sure no petals are being nibbled.
When you pick I carefully pull out any imperfect petals which can be quite fiddly. Blooms that are fully formed 2 or 3 days before the show are picked and stored in a vase of water in the dark in my garage. Blooms that have still to form can be cut and put in a light warm place such as a conservatory to bring them on a bit. I have been known to leave dahlias in my car until the last possible minute with the doors and windows shut to try and get them to open up as much as possible.
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