Caring for dahlias in the fall (preparing for winter): basic rules for a gardener

Dahlias are flowers that are unpretentious in summer, but in late autumn they require increased attention from the gardener. A large amount of work is due to the fact that dahlia, being a heat-loving crop, cannot remain in the open ground in winter. On the eve of frost, the plant is dug up and stored until spring in the basement or apartment - whichever is more convenient. Proper care of dahlias in the fall and preparation for winter of one of the most beloved crops by flower growers is a guarantee that next year the plant will surprise with its rare decorativeness.

2 Cleaning the area
3 Preventative examination
4 Hilling and pruning
5 Watering and fertilizing
6 How to dig up dahlias
6.1 Video: preparing dahlias for winter
6.2 Video: how to preserve dahlias in winter

7 Tuber division

8 Paraffin treatment

9 Autumn care for dahlias, taking into account regional characteristics

9.1 Reviews

What care does the plant need in the fall?

In the fall, efforts to care for dahlias are aimed at ensuring that the tubers successfully overwinter

In autumn, care is required for the soil on which dahlias grow (fallen leaves and debris must be removed - possible breeding grounds for infections), and the flower itself. It needs to be prepared for the coming cold weather - hill up, prune, change the order of watering and fertilizing, properly dig up the tubers.

Preparation for the winter period involves a number of activities, each of which requires some effort from the gardener, but allows you to save valuable planting material until spring.

Caring for the cold weather

Dahlias are flowers of the Asteraceae family. For many, they bring back memories of childhood, the first bell at school, or their favorite teacher. These plants are very popular among gardeners. Their main features are a long flowering period and relative unpretentiousness. Flowers can adapt to almost any environmental conditions. As for lighting, the flower feels great both in sunny areas and in complete shade.

Autumn is the time to prepare dahlias for winter. It is this period that is decisive in the future fate of flowers, because the key to a safe winter and rapid spring development is proper autumn care.

Autumn care for dahlias includes digging up the tubers and storing them. To determine the timing of digging, you need to focus on the condition of the flower. Dry stems and a brownish tint indicate that this is exactly the time. In the Moscow region and the middle zone, this period falls in November. In northern latitudes - at the end of October.

Cleaning the area

Cleaning the soil will help eliminate the possibility of transferring various kinds of diseases to healthy plants.

Not everyone attaches great importance to this work, but in vain: the ground near the bushes must be thoroughly cleared of fallen leaves, petals, branches, and any other debris, since it is in them that various pests survive the longest, as well as pathogens of dangerous fungal infections that can destroy both planting material and plants planted in flower beds.

Cleaning is carried out 2 weeks before digging up dahlias, keeping in mind that when the air and soil temperatures drop, the tubers become especially susceptible to infections. Autumn rains mean that pests that have settled in plant debris can easily get deep into the soil.

Drying

If there is dry weather, drying can be done outside, but most often the option is chosen indoors. The dug up tubers are placed with the stem cuttings down so that water and juice drip from them freely. The ideal temperature for drying ranges from 8-10°C. The decision to dry in the house will lead to drying and death of the planting material.

Drying lasts about 10 days, provided there is good ventilation or frequent ventilation of the room. Then the stems are further shortened, leaving stubs of about 3 cm.

Preventive examination

Sampling of affected plants should be carried out with special care.

All plants have to go through it. If a gardener finds dahlias affected by one disease or another, dried on the root, he will have to dig them up with a clod of earth and burn them in order to stop the spread of infection to neighboring crops. Characteristic signs of infection are a white coating caused by a fungus, brown spots, rot, as well as suspiciously rapid drying of the stem and leaves of the dahlia.

Non-viable plants that have never produced buds throughout the summer and whose stems are too long and fragile are also subject to culling. Unfortunately, we cannot expect that the result will be different next season.

Transplanting herbaceous perennials from containers into the garden.

Herbaceous perennials, both those with unusual foliage and flowering ones, can be purchased in containers throughout the active season, from spring to autumn.
Changing the residence of such plants from container culture to open soil is not a difficult task. But for successful adaptation of garden perennials, you need to take care of the correct timing, organization of replanting and care. Thanks to herbaceous perennials in pots, you can quickly create flower beds, obtaining highly decorative compositions in a matter of months, without waiting for small seedlings or seedlings to reach their maximum size. Usually these are already mature plants that are at the peak of their decorative potential and can bloom, if not in the current season, then already the next year after planting. This is an excellent lifesaver for filling voids, “quick” design and changing the appearance of the garden, correcting existing design or re-arranging flower beds and edgings.

Hilling and pruning

Some gardeners believe that if you cut all the stems with one cutting tool, you can spread viral infections to a significant part of the collection

Autumn hilling will protect the root system of the flower from possible night frosts. You can hill up the bush in the first week of September or at the end of August. The height of the mound at the base of the stem should be from 8 to 12 cm.

Trimming the stem at a height of about 15 cm from the ground is carried out after flowering has completed, and each “stump” must be equipped with a tag with the name of the dahlia variety.

Protection from early frosts

In autumn there is a danger of damage to dahlias from early frosts.
In some areas this may happen as early as the end of August or the first half of September. But at this time there may still be many growing, small buds on the dahlia bush. It would be a shame if they were damaged and the flowers did not bloom. Therefore, it is necessary to take measures to protect dahlias from autumn night frosts. To do this, the bush is simply covered with spunbond covering material. If you can do this daily, then do so. If you are leaving the dacha for the whole week, then you can cover the dahlias for several days.

One layer of spunbond is enough to protect dahlias from frost. Just wrap the entire bush, tying it along the top with twine. There is no need to press the covering material too tightly so as not to damage the flowers or break the shoots. The lower part can be pressed to the ground with stones.

This way you can protect your dahlias from early autumn frosts.

Dahlias in the garden in autumn

Watering and fertilizing

After each watering or fertilizing, the soil under the dahlias must be loosened and weeds removed.

When it comes to watering, the gardener has to act against nature. The plant, preparing for winter, strives to stock up on moisture, accumulating it in the internodes located in close proximity to the roots. Thanks to this, the tubers will not dry out and active growth will be possible in the spring. However, if there is too much water, it will cause waterlogging of the root collar and rotting of the tubers. To prevent this from happening, watering is stopped two or at least one week before digging up the plants.

If it rains more often, the flowerbed with dahlias is covered with a moisture-proof film so that as little water as possible gets to both the plant itself and the soil.

As for fertilizing, restrictions are introduced here too. When preparing plants for dormancy, the last time fertilizers (potassium and phosphorus) are applied no later than August 20. Dilute 1 tsp into 10 liters of water. potassium sulfate and superphosphate and spend an average of 2–3 liters of solution on each bush.

Alternative Approach

There is a rather unusual way to store dahlia tubers. It consists of using paraffin as a protective material. The roots are prepared in the usual way, dried well and dipped in melted paraffin. After it hardens, the roots are wrapped in paper and sent to the box.

With properly organized wintering, the tubers sprout quite quickly in the spring.

In addition, the shrub grows resistant to various types of pests and environmental factors. And this is a guarantee of lush and colorful flowering.

Tuber division

The main goal of separation is to obtain root tubers of optimal size, when the number of growth points, and, accordingly, shoots on them, will allow for the most luxuriant flowering and proper development of plants

Experienced gardeners divide the tubers soon after digging - leaving this work until spring does not make sense, since the tubers will become coarse and the procedure will become more complicated. During the division process, the planting material is marked so that in the spring the most interesting flower arrangements can be created on the site.

How to store tubers at home - why and how to label the roots

If there are at least several varieties of dahlias in the flower industry, then you will need to resort to labeling. This procedure is done to avoid re-sorting. In addition, the strongest tubers are marked with special signs, for example, asterisks. With the beginning of the new season, they can be used to obtain cuttings. Self-made tags are used for labeling. A piece of paper or a piece of plastic with the appropriate inscription is attached to the rope.

Labeling tubers will help avoid unwanted misgrading

You can also use the digital method for marking - apply it to the tubers or attach numbers in a certain order. In this case, you will also need an additional notebook for notes, where you will keep notes about which variety is indicated by which number. This procedure helps not to confuse the varieties of flowers and plant them in the garden bed in the required sequence.

Paraffin treatment

Immerse the tuber in melted paraffin for 1 second, remove it, wait a few seconds and lower it back into the resulting liquid.

This procedure well protects planting material from damage during winter. Dried tubers are dipped in molten paraffin. Then drying follows again for at least 2 days. In such a reliable shell, the rhizomes are placed in cardboard boxes. And they can even be stored in the room. When the sprouts begin to hatch in the spring, they will easily overcome the paraffin layer.

You can also use the chicken egg white treatment method. It is whipped, and then the rhizome is coated with it with a brush. To achieve a better result, the treatment is carried out 3-4 times, ensuring that each layer dries completely.

How to preserve chrysanthemums in winter?

Chrysanthemums have long been considered a decoration for the autumn garden.
Their flowering ends just before frost. But even grown at home, they require special care in winter. The warm and dry air of a heated house is deadly for these plants. Therefore, the question of how to preserve chrysanthemums in winter worries not only novice gardeners. There are several options for winter storage of chrysanthemums. They all come down to two main groups. The first involves storage directly on the site. The second is to transfer the dug plant indoors.

Autumn care for dahlias, taking into account regional characteristics

In an apartment, planting material should be stored in the coldest place; as a rule, they are placed in a box and placed next to the balcony

In the southern regions of Russia, there is a practice of leaving dahlias to overwinter in the ground. Acceptable low temperatures range from -5 to -7°C. Plantings are prepared for wintering as follows: the stems and leaves of dahlias are cut and removed from the flower garden, and the soil is covered with mulch from the bark or branches of coniferous trees. The protective layer should be 5–10 cm. Neither peat nor compost can be used as mulch: if air temperatures are positive, rotting of the cervical part of the roots may begin under a layer of these materials.

However, no matter how carefully the pre-winter preparation of plantings is carried out, there is still a risk of losing flowers. Therefore, many gardeners, even in the south of the country, fearing unpleasant weather surprises, dig up dahlia tubers. This happens at the end of October - beginning of November.

In the Urals, this work usually occurs at the end of September - the first days of October, in Siberia - it is limited to September. In the middle zone (including the Moscow region), dahlia tubers are usually dug up in early October.

Preparing dahlia for storage

After digging, all thin roots going in different directions from the tubers must be cut off. This must be done in the fall, so that during storage all these sections will heal.

It is good to treat dahlia rhizomes in preparations that are specially created for processing rhizomes and tubers (such as “Maxim” or “Hom”). You need to prepare a solution in a large container, and then soak the roots there in accordance with the instructions for the preparation, usually for 5-20 minutes. Then you need to dry everything.

Storage methods

There are several ways to store dahlias, and each gardener chooses the one that is most suitable and appealing to him.

As a rule, they use either boxes or other spacious containers for storage, where the roots will lie freely, with sufficient air.

You can cover dahlias with dry sawdust. Sometimes they are covered with dry sand and ash. Please note - all named materials must be dry! It is better to let the root dry out a little than to become wet and then rot because of this. Dried dahlia can be restored by soaking it in growth stimulants and it will come back to life. But you can’t do anything with the rotting one - just throw it away.

Dug up dahlia tubers

Storage conditions

As for storage conditions, dahlias can be stored in the cellar for the winter, but only if the temperature there does not drop below zero. Dahlia roots die even at -1 degree. Remember this.

You can put the dahlia roots in the basement or underground, but again, if it’s not too hot there, no higher than +10 degrees.

Humidity should be high, neither too high nor too low, somewhere around 50-60%.

Dahlia rhizomes can be stored in a box in the cellar

Waxing

Some gardeners use a method of storing dahlia roots coated with a layer of paraffin. This method is interesting because by dipping the roots into liquid hot paraffin, many pathogens are destroyed. And secondly, paraffin prevents the rhizomes from drying out.

Treated with paraffin, roots can be stored even at room conditions. There is no need to try to get rid of paraffin in the spring; sprouts will easily grow through it.

How can you not?

Under no circumstances should dahlias be placed in plastic bags. There they will suffocate and rot.