Asbury Park 
CULTURAL DIRECTIONS 
Plant your tubers in a horizontal position about 6 inches deep in well prepared 
soil. Allow about 3x4 feet for each plant. Soak well each week or ten days during hot 
weather. Keep the surface of the ground well pulverized. The dahlia will grow in al¬ 
most any soil, but prefers a well drained, sandy loam. The soil should not be worked 
until it has reached a stage where it crumbles when dug. Don’t plant your tubers in 
wet, soggy soil, for they are apt to rot before they sprout. We find the best time to 
add the fertilizer is when the plant is about half grown, provided you are using com¬ 
mercial fertilizer. 
When to plant your bulbs. Of course the section of the U. S. in which you live has 
much to do with this. Where the season is short, plant after all danger of frost is over. 
Dahlias planted too early are apt to rot in the ground or come into bloom in the hot 
weather, which is not their time of year. Dahlias will come into bloom from eight to 
ten weeks from time of planting, and will bloom continuously until taken by frost. 
Size of tuber or bulb. It has been our experience that small bulbs bring the best 
results. Too large a bulb absorbs so much of the plant food in the ground and robs the 
plant above. If your tuber is too large you can cut away the half furtherest from 
the eye without injury to the bulb. 
A word of warning. We would advise all dahlia lovers who are growing the Euro¬ 
pean varieties to take special care of the bulbs in storage. It has been our experience 
that most of the imported varieties are hard to keep thru the winter; these bulbs are 
not as hardy as our American varieties. 
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