Dahlia season will soon be upon us, and one of my garden projects this year was to come up with a support system for them. Even though their stems can grow super thick and strong-looking, unfortunately those stalks and large side branches are hollow and brittle and are prone to breaking off, especially as the plant grows taller or when we get a typical June gulley-washer (aka frog-choker or toad-strangler).
I have all of my dahlias planted in one large raised bed in my back yard (to maximize sun exposure). And since I have a fairly large area to cover, I really wanted to get away from having to stake each individual plant. I’ve done this for the past several years and it works pretty well. But as my dahlias grow taller and thicker, even they struggle to hold up to their top-heavy blooms
My original idea was to create a grid using PVC pipe and wire fencing with wide enough spaces to allow the dahlias to grow through. My raised bed is approximately 4 feet wide by 16 feet long, and I started by placing vertical lenghts of PVC (cut to 36 inches) around the perimeter of the bed, spacing them every four feet or so.
Tripp sourced these fittings for me so that I could add horizontal PVC around the perimeter as well as across the bed.
I found these brackets to attach the PVC to the inside of the wooden boards around the raised bed.
Next I spray painted the PVC with the hope that it would blend in and not be so noticeable.
In hindsight, this was a bad idea because it made the fittings too tight. So Tripp – BLESS HIM – helped me sand and grind the PVC to fit. This took way longer than it should have, but of course making things harder than they need to be is one of my special talents. Anyway, finally, and gratefully with Tripp’s help, we got all of the PVC supports attached.
The next step was to add the fencing to the top to create a grid, but sourcing that kind of fence (for a small area) was harder than I thought it would be. I tried creating my own grid with small gauge wire, but it wasn’t secure enough.
So I asked the internet and it told me about this heavy duty plant net/trellis from Amazon. According the description: Grow tent net designed to improve lateral plant growth and support heavy yields like fruit and buds.
Sidenote: Tripp is pretty sure this netting is designed for more – shall we say – commercial types of crops. lol
Anyway, once again, my beloved came to the rescue and helped me stretch the panels over the PVC pipe.
And I was pleasantly surprised by how strong and tight it was once it was installed. I also liked how it is still flexible enough to allow me to arrange some of the larger leaves and stalks through the spaces.
Over the weekend we some very heavy rain and all my dahlias were still standing straight and tall, so I’m hopeful that this support set up will continue to work for me as they grow larger and taller.
Anyway, I hope this gives you some ideas in case you have some plants that need some support. And as always, thanks for letting me share my projects with you!
Love, kelly
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