Margaret is entering all but one arrangement class and I am entering that one. The class is a mass design and it took me over an hour to put it together plus the time to pick the flowers and foliage. Red and yellow flowers. We will see how it does.
Her arrangements that are in the minivan are the white one, the red one, the miniature one, and she is working on the weathered wood and the water design. The 12 inch wreath is done but not loaded and the same for the nosegay. The basket has been loaded.
How many of my show flowers did she pilfer for her designs? Lots.
I am so looking forward to the photos and results, Ted! Even though I pretty much know what the results will be :-)..My favorite part of dahlia shows is looking at Margaret's creations when I get to the shows where she is participating.
teddahlia Aug 26, 2017 4:03 PM PDT
Name: Ted Oregon We enjoy breeding new dahlias!
Margaret did very well at the show. Leaving for the awards banquet; more later.
Of course Margaret did well, Looking forward to seeing pictures!
teddahlia Aug 26, 2017 9:55 PM PDT
Name: Ted Oregon We enjoy breeding new dahlias!
One picture as I need some sleep. This is Margaret's best in show arrangement. Flower is a red cactus that is a 2016 seedling and I posted several pictures of it last year. It is very nice. Design is about 5 feet tall and is of course a vertical design. 23 arrangements were entered.
teddahlia Aug 27, 2017 6:58 AM PDT
Name: Ted Oregon We enjoy breeding new dahlias!
Notice that Margaret only won second place on this one.
The winner in open but not winner overall.
The other entry in open. I liked this one a lot.
The winner came from the amateur division.
Gotta run. More pictures later.
teddahlia Aug 27, 2017 8:50 AM PDT
Name: Ted Oregon We enjoy breeding new dahlias!
The bottom flower is a mignon single and is named FV's Dainty(from kathy Iler of Blossom Gulch).
It is named after Florence Vandervelden deceased, a long time dahlia grower who entered arrangements too. She was less than 5 feet tall and weighed about 75 pounds and although in her mid 70s looked to be 115. She was an avid smoker. She loved her dahlias and I was able provide her with some Spiderwoman tubers back when. She had the energy of the proverbial energizer bunny. Her husband was also a dahlia person who had the reputation as being a most difficult person when judging. He knew it all and wanted to tell it all to you constantly. Most of the other judges refused to judge with him and I was selected for his team a couple of times. He loved to carry a penlight and peer into the darkest recesses of the bloom looking for defects. He was a symmetry freak and held a pencil up to the blooms at the midline to see if one side was slightly larger. He examined blooms for perceived "bearding" where the bottom florets may sag a little. After his thorough examination that that seemed liked several years, we would then have to guess which flower was better as he would not tell us. We would declare our favorite and since he was also one of the worst "devils advocate" people I have ever met, it would always be the wrong one and he would extol the virtues of the other flower. Yes, judging with him was very frustrating and took forever. I see that he recently died of a long bout with alzheimer's..
And for you East Coast people, Floyd Vandervelden drove a Checker. They lived near the ocean and the old Checker that may have formerly been a New York taxi, was riddled with so much rust that it had see through fenders. I am sure that Floyd had heard that Checkers could be driven for 400, 000 miles and he was going make sure he got his share of miles no matter what it looked like.
vikingcraftsman Aug 27, 2017 12:00 PM PDT
Good story Ted.
teddahlia Aug 27, 2017 12:59 PM PDT
Name: Ted Oregon We enjoy breeding new dahlias!
And for you East Coast people, Floyd Vandervelden drove a Checker. They lived near the ocean and the old Checker that may have formerly been a New York taxi, was riddled with so much rust that it had see through fenders. I am sure that Floyd had heard that Checkers could be driven for 400, 000 miles and he was going make sure he got his share of miles no matter what it looked like.
teddahlia Aug 28, 2017 12:51 PM PDT
Name: Ted Oregon We enjoy breeding new dahlias!
I entered a design at the show. It had be a mass design featuring red and yellow dahlias. HH Sunny Boy is on the bottom. Spreckles and Rudolph are in there and the yellow oversized pom is a third year seedling that needs a name. Even though the yellow pom only grows 3 feet tall it has lots of flowers. I have no idea where the yellow waterlily came from.
Margaret was disappointed that HH Black Beauty was not blooming in our garden as she would have used it in her basket and arrangements. I should have planted it earlier from both cuttings and tubers(cuttings bloom earlier). It was very represented in the show and the best BB triple in show was an entry of it.
Margaret wanted Black beauty for this basket. It would have made it much better.
Meanwhile she used the little black oversized pom flower that now has a name: Hollyhill Black Cherry.
It is darker in color when a bit immature, Here it is fully ripe.
Love the name for that! I hope you will be selling it as it would be a very useful size for me. I grow Monrovia which is a pom but never enough of them...the slightly bigger size of Black Cherry would be nice.
I picked the following flowers out as photos of the ones I would like in my garden. I didn't take photos of the ones I suspect are Hollyhills because I already am testing them or I know I want them from the seedling pics Ted has posted over the years...
#3
#8
#29
#35
#38
#39
#43
#51
#52
Forgot to get the number
And I am missing two here I thought I took...a very tall peach ball prettier even then Rossendale Peach and one much like Crazy4Carol, a miniature incurved cactus on long thin strong stems but more soft yellow and bright pink...maybe just a little bit bigger the Crazy4CArol but not much...
Benny101 Aug 29, 2017 3:09 PM PDT
Greenville MI - zone 5b
There was a very nice bloom of HH Dr Rick on the head table at our show last weekend but I failed to grab a photo or look at the name on the tag , will look when the results are posted .
I stood around the head table for a bit while the judges were just starting to judge that section but since I had a club name tag on I must have looked official and was suddenly bombarded by questions from visitors whom had never grown dahlia before , Having nothing on the head table and my tummy starting to rumble I headed home for some lunch and a nap
From the Bayard Cutting Arboretum 2017.
Looking forward to seeing pictures!
From the Bayard Cutting Arboredum 2017.
#3
#8
#29
#35
#38
#39
#43
#51
#52
Forgot to get the number
From the Bayard Cutting Arboredum 2017 a bit of sunshine from me.