My award for ‘Most disappointing plant of the Year’
It has been a tough year in the garden. A ridiculously wet winter was followed by a cold and windy (and wet) spring and I was thinking I would never be able to get to do any gardening by the time we got to March. Any paddling about the lawns caused damage. But then we had summer and almost as soon as I had planted the bedding the rain stopped and the sun came out. I now have brown lawns, wilting trees and hedges are dropping leaves as though it is autumn.
It has not been an easy season. It is wise to adopt an attitude of planning what to do but be flexible in the garden. I dot annuals about in various places but I also have a formal, square bed that is home to annuals in various styles each year. This season I planned a ‘hot’ scheme with cannas and a main planting of dahlias. I do grow dahlias for cutting but wanted a large number of smaller, shorter plants. I dislike very dwarf plants and was excited to find ‘Black Forest Ruby’. It is a new(ish) dark-leaved, red-flowered seed-raised cv and looks a bit like the old ‘Bishop of Llandaff’ but stouter in habit.
I ordered two packets of 50 seeds because I wanted at least 50 plants.
Or I thought I had. I had sent off my autumn seed order and then realised that I had forgotten the dahlias. The dahlias were such an integral part of the plan and I was so excited to grow this new dahlia that I made up a second, smaller order and sent that off in spring and, at last, I had my dahlia seeds! Success!
The seeds cost about 10c each. Dahlias are very easy to grow from seeds and the seedlings grow quickly so they were sown among my ‘second sowing’ batch, in early April. I was disappointed that although germination was quite quick only about 30 seedlings appeared from the 100 seeds and when I ignored the couple of distorted seedlings I ended up with 28 seedlings. That meant that my plans for the bed had to change – it was eventually planted with heliotrope, petunias, cannas and abutilons (which actually works well).
‘Black Forest Ruby’ is, according to All America Selections (AAS) trial, ‘Like a walk through a fairy tale forest, this newest AAS Winner emerged from the AAS trials in a burst of brilliant color! Black Forest Ruby is a “gem” of a plant featuring striking deep black foliage and abundant ruby-red flowers. Blooms range from semi‐double to double, enhancing its diversity and charm. ‘
It also has a Fleuroselect Gold medal because ‘The Fleuroselect jury praised its visually exceptional red flowers against the dark foliage on full, uniform plants and saw high potential for growers, retailers, and consumers.’
Now I concede that it has been a tough year. We have not had rain for a month and it has been very hot. But I planted these dahlias in a row in a well-prepared bed that is backed by hostas (that are plainly suffering but are alive), a row of verbena, which is loving the summer and that faces south.
Apart from the slightly dodgy early start I am annoyed with the plants in so many ways. ‘Ruby” – I am afraid it is not ruby in my opinion. But apart from that the plants are dreadful. The plants are not uniform! Now I don’t usually care for regimented plants and I actually like some diversity but these vary in habit from tall, rangy plants with long internodes to compact, almost stunted things barely 15cm high. the tallest are 45cm high which is about what it is supposed to be (60cm). In case you think they have suffered from drought, this bed is watered every other night. (I am on a well so can use the hose)
Even so, the growth habit is very uneven. I gave them room to grow and the soil had a dressing of fish, blood and bone at planting time. I have also deadheaded them which has revealed a big problem. The terminal buds appeared after about three or four pairs of leaves and there is little basal branching so there is a limited number of flowers the plants can produce. So now some are just deadheaded stems and leaves.
But I am also disappointed that the flowers are all single. There are none of the promised doubles and semi-doubles. I was not expecting or wanting fully double flowers but a hint of a second row of petals would have been nice. I know that dahlias often produce flowers with fewer that usual ‘petals’ (ray florets) when stressed with drought but…
Of course the great thing about growing dahlias from seed is that you can dig up and save the tubers for next year. But I won’t bother.
The Biking Gardener 
I thought it was ‘Bishop of Llandaff’. Anyway, this is why I am so skeptical of new introductions that have not been around long enough to prove their value.
I like to try new things but that always risks disappointment – but also some new favourites
Not to be repeated then!
No. I will put this one down to experience
Dahlias do not grow true from seed. Each seed will produce a genetically different plant with characteristics determined by the pollen deposited by bees that visited different seed parents. This is further complicated by the fact that a dahlia has a diploid chromosome number of 32, giving rise to a large number of possible genetic combinations. On average, ~90% of the seedlings from open pollination will be unattractive or weak. You did really well to get only a few wonky ones! This is why commercial growers propagate their stock from tubers or cuttings. I agree that it appears Bishop of Llandaff was one of the ancestors for your seedling. I really enjoy your posts and look forward to them
Years ago I grew seedlings from seed x ‘Twynings After Eight’ and none had white flowers. Most had dark leaves but flowers were all colours. All were pretty but they were very variable. But ‘Black Forest Ruby’ is a seed strain and is sold as being very uniform so I would expect it to be pretty good, especially as it has awards for being ‘good’. I do grow most dahlias from tubers and cuttings and would never expect a packet os big doubles to produce flowers like the pictures on the packet which are usually of the parents and not what you get from the packet! thank you for your comments on the posts.