The Mitcheldean Garden 2023
Dazzling Dahlias 2023

This page is part of a series of garden blogs from 2023. Click here for the index.

Dahlias (and roses) are for me the quintessential English summer flowers, the mark of civilisation as far as I am concerned. From the evidence ofmy eyes, it's not an opinion that seems to be shared by most of the inhabitants of Mitcheldean.

Click on a picture for a larger version and click on that to return to this page.

Take a deep breath and prepare to be assaulted by an avalanche of colour, Our smallest dahlia plants are of the dwarf variety (left), the largest (right) is a monster in Yuehong's bed in front of the house. I have left out the 'patio dahlias' as they are small flowered varieties which we have mainly relegated to the patio as part of the background.

Traditionally we have used the bed next to the former vegetable patch for dark dahlias, white at the front and the more prolific purple at the back, with some African marigolds at the front for contrast. This year for their own good reason, the purple ones underwent mass division over the winter which produced young plants with few flowers, so many that I had to find some space elsewhere to plant the excess. 

Next to them is a bed of the red varieties which have had a very good year. Roughly half are much taller which works very well in a square bed, they are on the left in the second picture.. Behind is a second main dahlia bed and two rows of runner beans. On the right is our original white phlox which outgrew its allotted space in the lily bed. We did a less than perfect job, quite a few got left behind, it's not a disaster as we'll have a handy supply of more small plants this autumn.

We've always had moles, usually they wait until they sense we are 'not at home' but this time one couldn't wait and one morning we could see the earth moving, literally. All I could do is remove the earth which came in handy for filling the holes left by the removal of the roses at the front. No wonder the grass here drains well.

These are the classic views of this year's display. Some of the dahlias were slow to start and missed the cut off for planting out, later they went into tubs which I put on the wall. In front were some early gladioli and my favourite red salvia, this year they came from Castle Combe Steam Rally. 

Here are a couple more overall views, the colour mix changes as the season progresses, the red and purples dominate to start with followed by the whites and then finally the yellows and oranges but there are always one or two which haven't read the playlist.

Click on a thumbnail for a full size picture. The first two pairs of pictures show the same two blooms changing as they develop, it's the final yellow central area which seems to act as a lure for the bees..

When the rain comes and the wind blows, flower stalks bend and the blooms end their days in the bungalow, much to Yuehong's delight.

So far we've had 6 weeks of colour, they are past their peak now but they easily lasted another 4 weeks until they had to come out while we were preparing to transfer to Penang.

Click here for the next part.

Click here for the 2023 index.