Hot Summer = Dahlia Hell
The blistering weather that ravaged Texas and Oklahoma last summer was just the tip of the (melting) iceberg, it seems, as this year more than half of the country is suffering from record-breaking heat and drought. Farmers, of course, have the most on the line and our hearts go out to them, but it hasn’t been much fun for gardeners this summer either.
Our dahlias have been especially hard hit — and we bet yours have, too. Some in our trial garden never emerged, others sprouted but died no matter how much we watered, and the rest are less than half the size they usually are by now (a couple are barely a foot tall!) and none of them have many blooms. The problem is that dahlias are native to the high-altitude plateaus of Mexico where days are hot but nights are dramatically cooler. When nights stay warm, it’s as if they can’t breathe well and they almost seem to go into suspended animation, growing very slowly or not at all.

Louise, That’s so interesting – thank you for sharing it! I wonder if they’ll be able to recover now that nights have cooled back down… -kris