We need a thread that records "Dahlia Tourism". Many of us visit dahlia locations and need a place to share our experiences and pictures. I will always remember visiting such places as AC Dahlias, Ferncliff Dahlias, Clearview Dahlias, The Tacoma Trial Garden, Swan Island Dahlias and a hundred other places that others may want to see. Here are some pictures from my visit to Park's Dahlias on Sunday last. This may be my favorite dahlia place to visit and I have been to very many.
Link to my 2014 article on that visit to her farm: http://portlanddahlia.com/Gardens/ParksClackVisit2014.html
blown_dry Sep 27, 2016 8:22 AM PDT
Name: Amanda CA Redwood Coast - Zone 9b DahliaAddict.com
Wow! Thanks for sharing photos. I would love to do this next year. Does Clacks still do an open house after the Roseburg show also? Does one have to be an exhibitor at the show or club member to go to the open house?
teddahlia Sep 27, 2016 8:47 AM PDT
Name: Ted Oregon We enjoy breeding new dahlias!
I spent a couple of hours at Clacks on Sunday but did not take any pictures of us sitting in the shade talking about everything dahlia.
We were in the tent back there. Clacks is nearly always open for visitors while it is somewhat difficult to get to see Parks Dahlias.
blown_dry Sep 27, 2016 9:22 AM PDT
Name: Amanda CA Redwood Coast - Zone 9b DahliaAddict.com
Sounds wonderful.
teddahlia Sep 27, 2016 1:27 PM PDT
Name: Ted Oregon We enjoy breeding new dahlias!
Has anyone visited Ferncliff recently? I have fond memories of our visit there 20 years ago.
My last and only visit to them was about this time last year. We had a great time, my sister and I and I ordered about $400 worth of tubers. (My husband put up with our trip by talking to "Mrs Ferncliff" about airplanes.) They do not let you go out in the fields but do have a nice garden with samples of each plant growing, and some other beautiful plantings of sunflowers and such along the drive. Its not very far across the border into Canada. Had the Boleys not been just in the process of moving still I would have tried meeting them for a visit as we went right through their new home town up at the border. What a day if would be to visit both growers, though I don't know if the Boleys accept visitors. Maybe with an appointment? There were a lot of nifty farm stands along the border selling produce, too and yummy food products for lunch.
teddahlia Sep 27, 2016 4:31 PM PDT
Name: Ted Oregon We enjoy breeding new dahlias!
The Boleys bought an undeveloped acreage near Birch Bay on the Puget Sound many years ago. They intended to build their retirement house there. Retirement came but the house did not as they could not get a building permit. Wetlands is what they said. They bought a house near the Canadian border in a town called Sumas. I believe they still grow the majority of their dahlias on the Birch Bay acreage.
NoH2O Sep 30, 2016 10:38 AM PDT
Name: Candy Everson, Wa
I love this thread, Ted. Thanks for starting it. Seeing other gardens can be both inspiring and intimidating!
I really enjoyed your article and pictures on Park's and Clack's. How many people does Christy have helping her? When I read about the 10' fence to keep out the deer and elk....whoa.....
teddahlia Sep 30, 2016 1:06 PM PDT
Name: Ted Oregon We enjoy breeding new dahlias!
Christy is a workaholic that hires no one and her husband Richard is a contractor who does not have a lot of time to help her. He likes to mow lawns and such. He did build her a really nice greenhouse and it is more of a house than a greenhouse with a concrete floor and wooden joists and panels of polypropylene covering it rather than poly film. He also made sure she had a full sized florist refrigerator too.
Name: Cynthia BG, KY USDA Zone 6b Sanity = Dirt under your nails...
blown_dry wrote:Wow! Thanks for sharing photos. I would love to do this next year. Does Clacks still do an open house after the Roseburg show also? Does one have to be an exhibitor at the show or club member to go to the open house?
IDK what Mark and Ember are doing, since we've been gone for over a year, but when we lived in MC, we just drove out there. Very rarely did we call ahead, and yet someone was almost always there.
That's where a lot of people went to buy fresh flowers - they'd go and someone from the house would come out and cut 12 stems of whatever flowers you chose as long as Ginger hadn't put one of the chosen cultivars on the 'forbidden' list because of an upcoming wedding or something like that.
C DG
teddahlia Oct 24, 2016 6:49 PM PDT
Name: Ted Oregon We enjoy breeding new dahlias!
Clacks Dahlias: Mark and Ember moved into town into a house formerly owned by a relative(grandparent?) Ember says she wants to be involved in the flowers but since she is a few miles away who knows how it will work out. Ron Clack said he was getting older and did not have lot of years left doing dahlias. Ginger is enthusiastic but she has had some minor strokes. They are planting fewer varieties but she gave me a list of some she wants for cut flowers.
