September has been the month to sit back and enjoy the dahlias; they have been exceptional this month. Dahlias are the hardest working flower in the kitchen garden, the more you cut, the more flowers they send up. They never show signs of tiring, and I’m guaranteed armfuls of blooms from July until the first frosts.
Here are my top 11 (I promise I did try to keep it to 10!) dahlias this year:
1. Dahlia Ambition – the pink just zings
2. Dahlia Cafe au Lait- stunning as a single stem cut flower, a sophisticated belle of the ball
3. Dahlia Paul Emory – A hum dinger of a dinner plate dahlia
4. Dahlia Franz Kafka – a pretty pom pom, very useful in a hand tie bouquet
5. Dahlia Furka – a fabulous pure white dahlia
6. Dahlia Hillcrest Royal – it brings a cut flower arrangement alive
7. Rip city – a gorgeous dark dahlia with prolific flowering
8. Dahlia Thomas A Eddison – One of my all time favourites, sadly not flowered as well this year
9. Dahlia Sam Hopkins – my favourite dark dahlia, a very versatile cut flower with lovely long stems
10. Dahlia Glorie van Heemstede – Inherited when we moved here, lovely long stems prolific flowering and looks great with several stems in a vase or mixed with one of the dark red dahlias
11. Dahlia Tamburo – A beautiful dark dahlia, another cut flower essential
I hope this has inspired you to start thinking about the dahlia tubers you’ll be ordering next year. A great place to start looking is The national dahlia collection website, it has a good system to help you search. It’s certainly worked for me, I’ve run out of room for dahlias in the kitchen garden so am going to build some raised beds in the front garden to squeeze a few more darlings in next year!