dahlia seed

Will dahlias come true from seed?? I have a lovely, what I would call, tropical fruit punch colored flower and I would like to get a load more next year. They are just your average single flowered bedding type dahlias, nothing fancy, but the color of this one is just juicyluscious! LOL So if they will be the same from seed I will collect a bunch.

 

The chances are that they won't come true. Dahlias are generally very complex hybrids of hybrids and no one knows their full family tree.

But you could take cuttings - they are clones and will come true.

 

Try both ways, i grew some from seed from the seed parcel ,Bishops Son, was on the packet, and they are very similar to my ,Bishop of LLandaff, so they havent thrown too far from the original

 

Good idea I will try both and see what happens!!!

 

They are easy from seed... Chilterns seeds do a mix called "The Bishops Children", which are from Bishop Of Landaff, they all have the same dark leaves but a mix of great coloured flowers, they will flower in the first year if sown early enough, January/February.

The only way to get exactly the same, is to take cuttings, the best time for this is, I think, in spring.

 

If other Dahlias are growing in the vicinity then it is highly unlikely you will get the same colour from your seeds. The only way to gaurantee the same variety is by cuttings. Having said that, you could have some pleasant surprises by sowing the seed and seeing what they produce.:gnthb:

 

If you allow the plants to grow seed, they will stop flowering this year.
In other words it means you need to stop dead heading.

Think I would rather just lift the tuber in the autumn and start early for cuttings next spring.

If you only want a couple of plants, you could divide the tuber next spring.

 

Thanks for all the info everyone it's a real help!!

 

I've just lifted this quote from the Chilterns site about Dahlia seed, it confirms what has already been said but I thought I should post it anyway.

"It is not generally realised that Dahlias can be treated as half-hardy annuals and readily raised from seed, flowering without any difficulty the same year. They do not come true from seed and the resulting flowers will be very variable. However, at the very least all will make excellent, much admired cut flowers and the tubers from the best can be lifted, stored and grown again the following year. This very variation makes growing Dahlias from seed quite a fascinating occupation."

Steve...