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I Think my tubers and growing tubers!!!

18 years ago

I dug up a couple of my tubers that havent shown themselves yet and although they dont have any eyes they do have roots (white spiky things coming out the end) and purple/white/borwn/green bumps about the size of dimes coming of various parts of the tuber. Are these new tubers? and will they be able to grow a plant next year?

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Comments (9)

Poochella
18 years ago
Dapper I have no idea. But after your post and digging up a couple of my 'slackers' I found a sort of pale purple/white bulbous projection on the 'root' end of a tuber. I've never seen anything like it, so I would like to hear from anyone who has seen this/these things before too. It looked like fresh growth. The tuber is healthy feeling, roots developing, but no eye/growth except for the purple/white invader.
DapperDahlia
Original Author
18 years ago
yup thats what i got! I wonder if i could use the tubers it grows and get flowers next year....does the tuber need to grow a plant to ever make another eye?
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If you look carefully at the tuber, you should see some tiny hair-like roots coming out of one end. That is the bottom. Sure, plant them in a pot and see whether they grow. I am just now potting some up, as they are just now starting to break dormancy. I agree, it is hard to tell the top and bottom of some. I also purchased some which fell apart. Actually when I started looking at them, I realized fairly quickly that there were several tubers wrapped around each other. I actually slowly twisted them apart, and got potentially more plants for the price of one. Now that is a good thing. Not all tubers will produce plants as some are there merely to store food. There needs to be an eye, and some eyes are very hard to see at first. I examined one just yesterday, and thought that there would probably be no plant coming from this particularly huge tuber (10" long). This morning, I can see the eye has swollen, and I know that I will have a beautiful red cactus style dahlia this summer which will grow to about 4 feet. Yahoo ! That is one I really wanted to save and multiply. Here is a small tuber, somewhat similar on both ends, but there are roots on one. These have developed over the past few weeks in a moist mixture. Originally, one could hardly tell the difference. That is why I lay it horizontally to help me determine where the roots are. Once planted the top end will definitely be up. Here is what a typical dahlia from the package looks like. Notice the stem. As you can see, there are many eyes on this one. Some folks like to cut off all but one eye. I like to get my exacto knife out and split them, making more plants. Read up about that first though. Here is a long tuber. One can hardly see the difference. If one looks VERY closely at the right hand side, one sees the eye starting to develop. Here is a closeup of the developing eye....starting to leaf. Isn't Mother Nature wonderful?
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Elizabethtown
18 years ago
Newbie to Dahlias. I'd like to know the answer to this because on of my non-sprouters is doing the same thing. No eyes but this.
grannymarsh
18 years ago
Annie: When you dug it up did you yell at it?? A reliable source suggested that........
Poochella
18 years ago
Hee Hee Granny!
It is such a slow, tedious cold wet Spring- oh excuse me SUMMER, that I am yelling at everything I can see. By now, I have forgotten which tuber had the bulbous purply/white growth, but if I find it, I'm yelling at it. To date, no little men in white coats have driven up with a paddy wagon. And when I read about how hot and humid everyone is, scorching in the searing temps I yell at the computer too! We have a chance to crack 60 here today- whoo hoo. When I read about buds or blooms already showing up, I throw viscious hisses toward the computer monitor and there's no telling what will happen when one of you dahlia enthusiasts posts a photo. It could be the last straw...

I have dug up and tried to save about 15 slacking/rotting tubers so far- I quit counting, it's too depressing. About half of those have since died and a mystifying number of them were yellows! Yellows of every shape and size. Hiss. At one point I was going to swear off dahlias ever again and grow peas and beans like normal people.

But I got over it : ) because hope springs eternal.
plantlady2
18 years ago
Oh, oh, Poochella- I thought normal people grew dahlias & the weirdos grew peas & beans...rats!!
kitty32_z8
18 years ago
OK?????? So does tha make me a wierdo reformed to normal? I have grown peas and beans for years and just have gotten the dahlia bug this year..lol.
I find screaming to be soothing on the soul if not the tubers ;). I am so lucky to have 5 acres. Keeps the paddy wagon from visiting!
I am waiting for the warm weather, It has been a hot winter nad a cool spring summer, Dont figure thats Washington for ya.

Kathy
plantlady2
18 years ago
And what does this make the husband who grows a row of beans along with his 8-10 thousand dahlias-- just slightly abnormal.... or all the way nutz??? >:)
dawnarose
18 years ago
I think that the problem with your tubers growing tubers and roots but no stem is that they didn't have an eye on them. Tubers will continue to grow but they will never sprout a stem if they don't have a piece of old stem with an eye on it. Sorry. Perhaps someone could experiment and find a way to graft a sprout of stem into the eyeless tuber.

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