Neville Green lives up to his name. The first-time entrant in the Guyra dahlia show at the Presbyterian Church Hall last weekend was named grand champion.
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The Guyra local’s flower also received the novice and large/medium decorative dahlia awards.
“It’s a bit of a surprise, actually!” Mr Green said. “I knew other people had good dahlias; I was lucky on the day.”
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Mr Green bought the bulb from the Black Mountain Nursery – and, he said, it turned out to be a good one.
He started growing dahlias a decade ago when he was living down the coast. He found when he moved to to Guyra nine years ago that the climate was ideal.
“You get so much bloom, the flowers are unreal!” he said. “You just keep the old dead ones off, and they keep coming. They’ll flower for months!”
He supplies his flowers to Kolora Residential Care and other local places.
Chief steward Mavis Ridley asked him to enter.
“Mavis has been a big help to me,” Mr Green said. “I've been able to grow them all right, but I've never shown them.”
He will probably enter next year, too.
Ron Cook, of Tenterfield, carried off the rest of the awards: pompon; ball; small/miniature decorative; and large/medium and small/miniature cacti.
He’s been growing dahlias for six years. He likes most the different colours and shapes.
“It’s great fun,” he said, “but lots of hard work – and the weather hasn’t helped at all!”
Nearly 300 entries were received from as far as Queensland; none from Armidale.
Judge Gerard Oldfield, from Mittagong’s Highland Dahlias, was pleased with the entries.
“Considering the extreme weather conditions, the standard of the flowers is reasonably strong, and with a very good entry that won the grand championship. Congratulations!”
The dahlia show ran at the Presbyterian Church Hall on January, Saturday 19, and Sunday 20.
This is the 19th year the festival ran. Mrs Ridley is already preparing for next year’s big anniversary; she’s collecting the oldest bulbs she can find to celebrate the 20 years. Her two oldest are 46 and just over 30 years old.
“If you wish to grow dahlias, and you can grow them well, go and see your florist,” Mr Oldfield said. “It's pretty good pocket money!”
To grow dahlias, dig up the ground, and put in the bulb with well-rotted animal manure, and some lime, put bulbs in.
Buy dahlia tubers from a reputable grower or distributor, Mr Oldfield advised.
“Shy away from [the stores] because they buy from growers that stick anything in a bag to get rid of it. You work just as hard to grow crap as you do to grow good ones – and to grow a good one, you don't work so hard.”
Once the bulbs start growing, look after them, water them, and feed them. Pick them early in the morning, and put them into cold water. The more you pick, the more they grow, Mr Oldfield said.
"You pick a flower; it thinks, ‘I'll beat this bugger!’; it puts two up. You take those two; it puts up four. Take those four; it puts up sixteen!"
A single plant could produce a thousand flowers by the end of the season. The plant makes new bulbs each year; separate the tubers before you replant them in spring.