To store dahlias at home successfully, you need to know how to dig them up and prepare for winter. They dig them out before the very frosts, after attaching a label indicating the variety, color, etc.
First you need to free the plant from props, garters. Then scoop up the soil and cut the stem a little shorter than the level of earthing up. Now, stepping back from the remaining stem of 20-25 centimeters, you need to dig a trench deep in the bayonet of a shovel and carefully pry off the tubers of the plant. The stem cannot be pulled to avoid damage to the root processes. They are very fragile.
Dug out the roots, slightly brushing off the ground, transferred to a room with an air temperature of 0 to 8 degrees and a humidity of 75-85% (you can put a basin of water next to it). In two weeks, the process of distributing nutrients and preparing for dormancy will be completed in the tubers. Before storing the dahlias for winter storage, you need to remove the earth from them, have a good look, remove small and old, broken and diseased roots. Cut off all unnecessary with a sharp knife, which is constantly dipped into a solution of manganese. Sections are sprinkled with ash or smeared with dark raspberry potassium permanganate.
Storage of dahlias at home occurs in boxes or boxes. Tubers are laid in one layer and covered with sand or peat. Then they are sent to a room with the same temperature as when storing potatoes (from +1 to +7 degrees) and humidity 60-70%. It can be a basement, a cellar, a subfloor, a heated garage. The refrigerator has the same conditions. Therefore, the storage of dahlias in the apartment is quite possible. What is needed for this?
The main objective is the safety of growth buds, root neck and tubers. If it is supposed to store dahlias at home in the refrigerator, then the bunch of tubers is washed, disinfected with raspberry potassium permanganate for 30 minutes and dried for a day. Then they put the roots in boxes or plastic bags and pour them with dry moss, shavings, etc. The container is left open for air. In the absence of ventilation, mold or rot may appear on the roots. Storage of dahlias at home involves periodic checks of planting material. If rot is detected, it is cut out, the cut is greased with brilliant green, and the backfill material is changed. Mold is washed off with potassium permanganate, the tuber is ventilated.
Small tubers can simply be wrapped in paper, put in a bag and, without closing, placed in the refrigerator or between the balcony (window) frames. Of course, subject to the appropriate temperature and the inaccessibility of direct sunlight.
During winter storage, dahlias can deteriorate for several reasons: thickened planting, excessive fertilizing with nitrogen fertilizers (manure, urea, etc.), lack of autumn hilling. If the summer was rainy or the autumn was warm with a sharp cooling, then the roots of dahlias do not ripen, that is, they do not accumulate a sufficient amount of nutrients. And without them, they cannot endure a state of rest.
But flower growers in such cases do not despair. They carefully inspect the almost ruined tuber in the spring. If at least one surviving bud with a small nodule is found, then the plant will bloom this year as well - the variety has been preserved.