About
Dahlia 'Croydon Jumbo' is a tuberous, herbaceous dahlia cultivar grown for summer to autumn flowering. It belongs to the Asteraceae family and arises from the Dahlia genus native to Mexico and Central America. The plant produces its blooms between July and October. As a tuberous perennial, it dies back after the season and regrows from stored tubers.
About the genus
Dahlias come from the high meadows of Mexico, and somewhere in that heritage is the explanation for how they behave here: tender to frost, hungry, generous beyond all reason. No other plant gives you quite so much for so little. One tuber, planted after the last frost, becomes a shrub's worth of flowers by August — and the more you cut, the more they come.The range is faintly ridiculous. Tight pompoms, spiky cactus types, singles the bees adore, dinner-plates the size of your face. Whatever your garden's mood, there is a dahlia that agrees with it, which is probably why every generation falls out of love with them and then, a decade later, falls straight back in.They're at their best when much of the garden is winding down — late summer into autumn, flowering hard until the first frost calls time. I think of them as the encore. And they always play it.
Written by Henry
In the garden
Dahlia 'Croydon Jumbo' is a named cultivar within the Dahlia genus, a group of tuberous, herbaceous perennials that originated in Mexico and Central America and are members of the Asteraceae family. Like other dahlias, this cultivar develops from swollen underground tubers and completes its top growth each year before winter dormancy. It flowers from July to October, providing a long season of blooms that follow summer vigour. This dahlia is not frost-hardy (H2 half-hardy) and needs protection in areas prone to hard frosts. Either lift and store the tubers after the foliage has been killed by frost, or give them a frost-free mulch or sheltered position through winter; the tubers will resprout in spring. Plants that are left in the ground without protection risk frost damage to the tuber crown. Dahlias resprout from their stored carbohydrate reserves (inulin) rather than starch, which affects how tubers respond to storage and handling. Grow it where its summer-to-autumn display can be enjoyed and label tubs clearly when lifting, because cultivars retain their identity only if tubers are handled and stored separately. Observant lifting and labelling will preserve Dahlia 'Croydon Jumbo' for subsequent seasons.
More in the Dahlia genus
- Dahlia 'Clearview Cameron' (C)
- Dahlia 'Elizabeth Snowden' (Col)
- Dahlia 'Katie's Velvet' (Col)Dahlia
- Dahlia 'LB Michael Braithwaite' (D)
- Dahlia 'Amazing Grace' (Misc)
- Dahlia 'Aurora's Kiss' (Ba)
- Dahlia 'Black Diamond' (Ba)
- Dahlia 'Bonanza' (D)