Dahlia tubers

Sally, I think you've been given good advice here about lifting and splitting your tubers and how to go about this by both Peter and Pete. I also think it's often more about the wet in the ground that determines whether or not tubers survive the winter if left out.

You could also think about taking cuttings...for lots of plants! Lift the tubers after the topgrowth has been frosted and blackened. Store somewhere dry over winter after gently removing as much soil as possible and cutting the stem back to 5 - 6 inches. Dry them off fully in a cool shed/greenhouse/garage for 3 - 4 weeks and then bury them in a box of dry sand or vermiculite. (I often just leave them on newspaper and they seem to be fine.)

Then in late winter, put the tubers in trays of moist general purpose compost, with the stem showing. This brings the plant to life and you'll get lots of new shoots appearing. Cut off as many as you want to make new plants from and a few spares for insurance, when the shoots are about 3". You cut them off the parent tuber with a small slice of the parent tuber still attached.
Trim off the lower leaves, dip in hormone rooting powder if you wish and stick two or three around the edge of a 3" pot. Put a plastic bag over the pots and secure with elastic bands. The cuttings will root in a few weeks and you can then pot each one up in a 3" pot. Keep them watered and maybe pot up into a bigger pot if they need it and you should have good plants for putting out after the frosts have finished in early June. They'll often flower in the first year too.

 

...also, meant to say, I totally agree with Dim's thumbs up for CGF site! Bob Brown knows his plants and has some lovely interesting stuff too, as Peter says. It's a terrible place to call at when you're on way home from holiday with no money....I once nearly needed a second mortgage after a visit to his nursery!!

 

it is his own personal observations, and I use his recomendations as a guideline, then research further on google if I like what it looks like

makes it a lot easier for me, especially if you are after a specific family of plant that has hundreds of different varieties such as Dahlias .... when looking at the sites, it normally shows one photo of a flower, and not the whole plant in bloom

same goes for clematis ... some flower profusely from ground level, right to the top, and others have very pretty flowers, but very few

If Bob Brown gives a plant a score of between 8 and 10, it's worthwhile investigating further

 

And another

eurodahlia and station house nursery's home page