Anyones dahlias blooming?

Anyone in the north west have dahlias not yet blooming? I’m starting to think I won’t see a single flower this year
What am I doing wrong?

 

Nothing it's the odd weather, lots of things are slow this year.
Admittedly I'm not in the NW, but mine and other people round here have been saying how slow dahlias this year. Some of mine have yet to form flower buds, others in the greenhouse are just budding up now.
I'd continue to water and feed as usual, maybe switch to Tomorite to encourage flowering. Dahlias also tend to flower later in the summer into autumn.
Keep your fingers crossed for a mild autumn.

 

Thanks for the reassurance- I shall continue to wait patiently ​

 

I am in the North West and have some dahlias in flower and some just buds.

 

I'm along the Solent coast, overwintered Bishops children flowered briefly in July, now needing rain !! (Next to nothing 21 days +)

 

@Donna Crossman - have you fed your dahlias at all? A feed with too much nitrogen in it will cause the dahlias to grow lots of lush green foliage at the expense of flower buds. A good tomato feed is what you need now.

Also, where are your dahlias sited? They need about 6 hours of sunshine/day to flower at their best. I appreciate that’s a bit of a tall order possibly this summer but if they are in a shady part of the garden, it might cause them to struggle.

Don’t lose hope, plenty of time yet and some are notoriously late.

 

Have you had slug damage to them @Donna Crossman ? That effectively nips out stems, but side stems will eventually appear, if they don't get eaten again....
Mine are only starting to get going now, mainly because of the even worse slug problem this year, but I've had to put pots into moats to try and help, which it does.
Some also bloom earlier than others, so the variety/varieties you grow is a factor.

They do need plenty of food and water, and even here, I still have to check they get enough water as the foliage prevents the rain getting in well enough. We've already had nearly 140mm of rain this month, so it's been easier, but last month was drier, so I checked mine most days.

 

As @Ezzie and @fairygirl have already mentioned dahlias are very greedy and need lots of water and feed. I water mine every other day and when it’s very warm I water every day. I also feed them once a week with Tomorite.
I’m in the south and mine have been flowering for a while apart from one. This one had it’s main stem accidentally snapped off and is now putting out lots of side shoots with little buds so as @fairygirl said if your main stem was nibbled off by slugs they will be delayed. Fingers crossed you get some late blooms

 

I am in South yorkshre
and I'm in .............

2024s dahlia s club of dissapointments

My Dahlias were not any slower to get into leaf than usual I put some in the garden about12 inch in height and decent filled out sized plants.some were left in the greenhouse
It was then my problems started , both inside and out they were devoured by snails and slugs .even when the rain stopped and we had the cold /not summer weather. Slugs and sluggs enjoyed a meal of fresh tender new foliage then we got our hot weather I have continued to water then when I had buds I started to feed with Tomerite .I have done nothing different but. some have not any buds and not much foliage even now.I've only 2 which have flowers and must admit I'm very happy with them
. The rest I'm afraid are a dead loss so hope we all have a better year with our dahlia s in 2025 , fingers and toes crossed.

 

Has anyone checked the tubers.
Just wondering if the tubers were being attacked by slugs or vineweevil earlier in the season.

 

Another well known pest for dahlias is earwigs, although they tend to be mostly a problem when there are flowers.
Are yours all in the ground @Purple Streaks? I can't put them in the ground - in any year. Mine are all potted, and I have to use the 'moat' method to help keep slugs away, even in decent summers because they're always a presence here.
Some of the worst slug culprits are the tiniest ones too, which you hardly notice. The snails can be even tinier - I picked one up this morning when I was out checking something, and it was smaller than a lentil. Slugs are worse for dahlia damage though.
I find the seed sown ones are much easier to keep happy, but again, it doesn't mean they don't get eaten. It's a case of checking regularly and crossing fingers. We're all trying to avoid using slug pellets nowadays too, so that possibly makes it worse for many people.

I remember when I started growing dahlias again a few years ago, after a couple of decades of not having them, I realised very quickly why I'd stopped growing them!

 

I'm in N London and my Dahlias are way behind where they would normally be. I do have some flowers, some are flowering quite well now but others are yet to produce anything. This is yesterday's picking, I would normally fill 3-4 vases at a time.

 

I have a mixture of both fairygirl even some pots in the greenhouse. A nd they have been attacked too.
I have checked some of the tubers earlier on,they were ok but its definitely the silly weather conditions as by now I have been usually dead heading and cutting flowers for several weeks.

 

Here in "sunny" western France I have a 10m bed full of dahlias which stay in th eground all winter and flower prolifically from mid to late July and go on for months.

Not this year.

We had the wettest, greyest, longest winter and cool spring and, apart form the Bishop's children I sowed a few years ago, all the namedtubers have struggled to get going. It doesn't help that their bed was invaded by nettles and that constant rain battered the ones that did grow. Some are only just flowering now and with nothing like their usuam vigour or size.

The bed gets mulched with garden compost in autumn, after a decent rainfall and then more long grass cuttings form the wild areas are added in late autumn to protect the tubers. They get pelletted chicken manure in spring and the real stuff when we're cleaning out the hen house.

I haven't had a single bunch for the house cos they're short stemmed and a bit scrappy looking.

 

Thanks for all your support and replies. I don’t have much slug damage as they are all in pots and I have used nematodes to help control slugs which has worked well.
some are now slowly producing buds but mainly I just have a lot of leaves. It’s my first year of growing anything so I guess I should be pleased I’ve grown anything at all