Kristen, it's "turd" not terd. I'm pretty sure. LOL and an apt description! To answer your not-dumb-at-all question: what usually falls off those field grown clumps are non viable tubers. They need to have a piece of the stem collar from the previous year's growth with a viable eye (should be raised bump, possibly pink or light green in color by now, but some varieties are slow to show eyes.) I would wager your clumps are fairly tightly bound together and perhaps a growth shoot or two are emerging close to the visible old stem? If that were the case, you could hack off (carefully trim) all but the one tuber supporting that "eye" or growth shoot. If you have two shoots showing up a ways apart in the dreadlocks, you could ostensibly chop that clump in half and get two separate dahlia plants as long as each shoot had at least one tuber supporting its growth. Let any cuts you make dry for a few hours, dust with sulphur or spray with Lysol spray for fungus control and plop them in the ground. If I get a field clump like that I just take my pruners and lop off any broken necked floppy, loose tubers right away- they do not serve the plant any way at all. Good news on the 5 gallon containers. That should be way ample to accommodate any tuber or dahlia clump. People on the dahlia forum even plunk them right into the ground, planter and all. Easier to dig up and less destruction to tuber clumps come Fall excavation time. Also less prone to tipping over than if the container was on top of Mother Earth. Perhaps in your greenhouse, wind and rain wouldn't be an issue, but outdoors they wreak havoc on a tall plant laden with heavy blooms. The only trouble with growing in containers is staking a tall plant. Some of my 'four footers' have exceeded 6-7 feet. If you have shorter varieties, that won't be such an issue but my experience is that almost all dahlias over 2 feet benefit from staking and supporting somehow. Hope that helps.

To get the truest flowers (i.e. nearest to the stated size, color, form) it is best to have a single stemmed plant at the ground. It is also good to dis-bud and de-branch, but that's another story. I was introduced to dahlias by a friend who simply yanked tubers off a very large clump and pushed them into the ground by hand. Those grew without any tending, and had many stems from the ground. They were beautiful, and had many flowers. However I had no reference...nobody knew what variety they were or how large the flowers were supposed to be. Ergo I had no idea whether the flowers suffered as a result. Now that all my dahlias are carefully chosen and labeled, I pursue flowers as close to ideal as I can get. For me, this begins with a single stem from the ground. More than one stem means multiple full plants would try to live in the space one needs. I use the formula that a dahlia needs a clear circle area the diameter of the height of the plant to thrive. This lets air and moisture get to all parts of the plant, and allows me to move around it to take flowers and tend the plant (dis-bud/de-branch.) If two stems are left to grow from the single tuber each will suffer. But again, it doesn't mean they won't grow. Pick the stem that seems to be the best. That might be the tallest, the thickest, the best formed...no need to choose until they are all 10" - 12" tall. I would suggest you pinch them just below the lowest set of branches that are above ground. This will, hopefully, prevent them from causing even more sprouts to occur. Cheers, Russ

The only way to know for sure is to watch the clump for additional eyes/sprouts to form. You might want to place the clumps ( and long tubers fallen from the clumps) into some damp peat or soil and keep an eye on them for a couple weeks. If nothing else, plant the clumps with the known eyes. If you see other sprouts, there is a long thread on dividing tubers from last October/November or so. Good luck.

Bummer that you lost so many. Sounds like you have a good handle on it, but luck wasn't on your side this time. I always try to prestart my tubers so they have roots and sprouts before planting into the garden. A percentage of these seem to fail regardless of the conditions, and might just fail if put directly in the garden as well. A mentor of mine believes that last year's conditions can influence this year's tuber quality, and a wet fall before the tubers are dug or over-fertilizing late in the blooming season is a recipe for disaster. You do the best you can, then move on to do the best you can the next season. Even very experienced growers lose their tuber crop once in a while... it happens.