I am not an expert, but have been reading some articles on pollination recently. (I stayed at a Holiday Inn). You need a pollinator, or, this is from the Missouri Extension Service: In situations where a solitary apple tree is planted, branches of open fresh blossoms of another apple or crabapple pollinating variety can be placed in buckets of water and hung in the tree. Another way to ensure pollination where a single tree is planted, is to top-work or graft another apple variety onto the existing tree. To top-work an apple tree, 6- to 8-inch sections of branches of one apple variety are cleft-grafted onto terminal branches of another variety. It is possible there is a plum tree elsewhere in your neighborhood that some bees alighted upon and then landed on yours. However the Missouri Ext Service indicates that plums benefit from a pollinator. They do not say a pollinator is required to produce plums. Here is a link that might be useful: Missouri Extension Service Pollination article

Image and ID are in a different thread... Rosie Here is a link that might be useful: tswon first post

Seed saving can be simple or complex depending on what you are growing and also what your goal is. If you want to save a specific variety, and keep the genetics intact, you may need to isolate the blossoms to prevent crossing with other varieties. Tomatoes are easy and mostly just self-fertile, and pretty forgiving about seed saving techniques. So you don't need to worry so much about another variety cross-pollinating with your toms. Lettuce is another easy one. Corn is wind pollinated, and pollen can travel 2 miles, so depending where you live, all sorts of things could blow in. Many root vegetables, such as carrots, are biennial, so you need to leave some of them them in the ground for a second season to get seed. There is a lot to learn, but if it's just for your own use and you aren't a perfectionist, you can experiment freely.

Engrgirl, there can be a great deal of variation in bloom times from one dahlia to another. I grew 30 different dahlias here in CO this year, and the first bloom on one of them was around the end of July. Another one, treated identically didn't offer the first bloom until mid-September, with the others falling in between. It was a season with a late start because of lots of cold rain in May, so I didn't get them out until late May. I agree with cici that more shade will only make your problem worse. Did you remove the plants from the pots when you planted them? I've had good success in past years by starting the tubers in big 2 gallon pots, drilling lots of holes in them to allow big roots to make their way out, and setting pot and all into the ground at planting time. I would recommend digging some balanced fertilizer into the soil at planting time, especially in new, sandy soil that doesn't already have anything in the way of nutrients. I have well drained soil and have to water my dahlias almost every day. It's also a good idea to put your supports in the ground at the same time as your dahlias. I use five-foot long rebar. If your plants were already flopping over to the ground at two - two and a half feet, it sounds like they were either already stretching to reach more sun or subjected to a lot of wind. If your soil is really sandy, it may not be holding the water and nutrients well enough for the plants to make use of them, in which case some added organic material such as peat moss or shredded leaves worked into the soil might help. I hope you may find some of this helpful.