When and How to Wake Up Your Dahlia Tubers
Waking up your dahlia tubers allows the eyes to sprout and lets you know that your tubers are viable. Join flower farmer Briana Yablonski to learn how to complete this process.
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Dormant dahlia tubers don’t look like much. But as long as you start with healthy tubers and provide the proper care, these funny-looking potatoes will turn into robust plants covered with the beautiful flowers we love.
While each healthy tuber should have an eye that will sprout into a plant, it’s sometimes difficult to spot these tiny eyes, let alone know if they’re viable. Waking up your dahlias encourages the eyes to sprout and lets you know that they are worth planting. It also helps you jump-start the growing season and allows you to take cuttings.
Not sure how to wake up dahlia tubers? No problem! I’ll cover when and how to complete this process at home.
What Does Waking Up Dahlia Tubers Mean?
If you want to grow dahlias at home, you have two main options: start with seeds or tubers. While both options can lead to beautiful flowers, tubers produce blooms identical to the parents. That means they’re the best way to ensure you end up with your favorite dahlia, whether that’s a large white dinnerplate dahlia or neat maroon pompons.
When you order dahlia tubers or save them from year to year, you count on each tuber having a healthy eye. This eye is located on the crown at the top of the tuber’s neck and is the portion that will grow into a healthy plant. However, it can be challenging to spot eyes on dormant ones.
Waking up your dahlia tubers involves placing them in conditions that allow them to break dormancy. In practice, it means moving them from a cool, moist area to a warm, moist area. The increased temperatures will cause the eyes to sprout, letting you know that the tuber will produce a plant.
Do I Need to Wake Up My Dahlia Tubers?
No! If you know your tubers are healthy or don’t mind taking a risk, you can plant without waking them up. However, they may not sprout and produce plants.
Waking up your tubers also gives them a jump-start, so you can expect these pre-sprouted roots to produce blooms earlier than those that you planted straight from storage. Therefore, I encourage pre-sprouting if you live in an area with a short growing season.
When to Wake Up Dahlia Tubers
You should begin waking up your dahlia tubers four to six weeks before you plan to plant them outdoors. The ideal planting time varies depending on where you live, but you can use your last spring frost date and the soil temperature as guides.
Dahlias can’t tolerate cold, so wait until after your last spring frost to plant them outdoors. Waiting until the soil warms up to 60°F (16°C) will limit plants’ stress during the transition from their cozy indoor environment to the outdoors. Warm soil will also support the plant’s growth.
Taking Cuttings From Dahlia Tubers
Most growers plant dahlias directly in the ground. However, you can also wake up your dahlia tubers earlier in the year and take cuttings of the resulting sprouts. Propagating dahlias using this method allows you to get multiple plants from a single tuber and enjoy flowers earlier in the year.
If you want to take dahlia cuttings, you should wake up your tubers earlier in the year. Starting the process in January or February gives them plenty of time to sprout and allows you to pot up cuttings before they head outdoors.
How to Wake Up Dahlia Tubers
Waking up dahlias isn’t difficult. Simply put, it involves placing the roots in a warm and moist environment that encourages them to sprout.
With that said, there is plenty of room for error. Providing too much moisture, too little moisture, and inadequate temperatures can lead to rotten roots or dying sprouts.
Follow these steps to wake up your dahlias at home.
1. Inspect
Unhealthy tubers will never produce dahlia plants, even if you provide them with the ideal environment. So save yourself some work and toss out any bad ones before you start the wake-up process.
Dahlia tubers need three main parts to produce a healthy plant: an eye, a healthy neck, and a tuber. If the neck of the tuber is broken or the tuber is shriveled or rotten, it won’t grow into a healthy plant. It’s okay if they have dried out some in storage and developed a wrinkly exterior. However, if they feel hollow, they’re probably not viable.
2. Place in Vermiculite or Peat Moss
After you inspect your roots, place them in a container filled with vermiculite or peat moss. These materials will hold some moisture and prevent them from drying out.
If you have a large quantity, you can stack them in multiple layers in a single container or place them in single layers in multiple trays or bins. Whatever option you choose, carefully handle the fragile ones to avoid breaking their necks or crowns.
3. Increase the Temperature
Once you’ve tossed any unhealthy tubers, find an area with a temperature between 65-70°F (18-21°C). This can be a warm area of your home, a greenhouse, or a shed. You’ll also have to control the humidity in this area, so choose a location that can withstand extra moisture in the air.
It’s important that the temperature doesn’t rise much above 70°F (21°C). If it hits 80°F (27°C) or higher for an extended period, the resulting sprouts may die.
4. Increase the Humidity
High humidity prevents the tubers from drying out as they wake up. Ideally, the humidity is between 75-90%. There’s no right way to increase the humidity, but the following methods can work well.
Use a Humidifier
If you wake up your dahlias in an enclosed area like a bathroom or shed, you can use a humidifier to increase the air moisture. Since the roots prefer high humidity, the device will probably run most of the time. However, the air can become too moist, so monitoring the humidity levels is a good idea.
You can purchase humidifiers that automatically turn off once they hit the ideal moisture level. Another option is to connect your humidifier to a humidity controller that signals the appliance to turn off once the air reaches the intended number.
Place in Moist Vermiculite
If you don’t want to increase the humidity in your entire bathroom or spare bedroom, you can also place your tubers in a container filled with moist vermiculite. The vermiculite will hold moisture without becoming saturated, so it’s a better option than peat moss or a soil mix.
The vermiculite should be barely moist—too much water can cause rotting. Spritzing the material with water is better than adding water with a watering can or hose.
5. Watch for Sprouts
Monitor the humidity and temperature for two weeks. Spritz the vermiculite with water if it feels completely dry, and add more water to your humidifier as necessary.
You should see healthy eyes begin to sprout within two to four weeks. Once the sprouts emerge, they are ready to plant! The sprouted eyes can sit in a warm and humid environment for a few weeks if you’re not ready to plant.
If you want to take cuttings, move them to pots filled with a slightly damp soil mix and place them under grow lights. The sprouts will continue to grow and be ready to cut in a couple of weeks.
