Setting your first Dahlia growing season up for success

Dahlias come in a wide variety of forms and colors – from large dinner plates to tiny pom poms.  They are incredible flowers that will level up your bouquets or gardens. More often than not, once you get started with growing Dahlias, you become hooked and inevitably your collection will grow exponentially!   However, Dahlia varieties vary in the number of blooms per season, vase life, and tuber production. If you’re excited about Dahlias, you’ll want to start with those that give you the most flowers and tubers, and those that last the longest when cut. Once you master those, then you can start to level up your Dahlia game!

My favorites: the Top 5 must grow Dahlias for beginners:

Wine-Eyed Jill Yellow

Wine-Eyed Jill Yellow is a beautiful pinkish yellow ball Dahlia with a cranberry center. It has a pinkish hue turning buttery yellow when the days start to cool down. With its two-toned coloration, it is really a stunner. This variety produced flowers up until October for us, and LOTS of them. No matter how much I cut, they would still come!  Another stunner is its cousin Wine-Eyed Jill - Pink. Also, gorgeous! We currently have these at the farm as well, but we are keeping all the tubers to build its stock and grow more.

Cornel Bronze

Cornel Bronze is a ball Dahlia with an orangish bronze color. It pairs great with summer and autumn bouquets. But it also cranks out the blooms right up until first frost. It was a wonderful tuber producer and for all of these reasons, this is a greater variety to start with.

Maarn

Maarn is another ball Dahlia that produces flowers non-stop. My favorite part is its bright, juicy, orange color – a total knockout. It looks amazing in the garden and in a bouquet. It would also look great in straight bunches. It grows nice and tall with long, strong stems, making it a dream to work with. Wonderful tuber producer.

Caitlyn’s Joy

With its warm and vibrant fushia color with bronze undertones, this beauty is a great one to add to your collection that ticks all the boxes: bountiful bloom producer, long tall stems, and a solid tuber producer. A real beauty.

Hilltop Glo

If you like purples, you’ll love this one. Hilltop Glo grows over 5 ft tall and is a flowering machine. Its purple / white coloring can vary slightly with each flower making it an interesting one to add to your collection.  

Honorable mention: Bridezilla

Although Bridezilla is a waterlily Dahlia, I can’t help but squeeze this one in. Her bloom is a stunning white with a glowing cream center. Being a waterlily, its petals lift up in a cup like way, making this flower look graceful and elegant. It also produced a lot of tubers and flowered consistently from summer through fall. Love this one!