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It’s lilac season

/ farm life, farmer florist, seasons of life / By sarahpabody

It’s lilac season: fragrant and fleeting, tied to deep memories; in-the-moment delicious and nostalgic all at once.

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triplewrenfarms

We share beauty: Dahlia tubers, rooted cuttings, seeds shipped in the U.S. and Canada + online Garden membership.
Pollinators love biodiversity! 🐝 We promote bio Pollinators love biodiversity! 🐝 We promote biodiversity in our dahlia fields by interspersing hundreds of types of gorgeous annuals between dahlia varieties within the rows. This not only helps us promote soil health and avoid having a monocrop in our field, but it also encourages bees and other pollinators to spend time pollinating our fields because they have a smorgasbord of flowers to choose from. 🌻🌼🌷🪻🌹 Native bees, gnats, flies, bumblebees, wasps, and all their amazing pollinating “cousins” are an integral part of our food web. They also are largely responsible for keeping billions of self-sowing wildflowers and ornamental perennials (and dahlias!) full of fertile seeds around the world! 💐  We love pollinators! 💓 👉If you’d like to know what our favorite annual flowers are that promote biodiversity, head over to our blog and search “annual biodiversity”. We’ll also link to it in Stories today. #triplewrenfarms #sharebeauty #dahlia #dahlias #growingdahlias #biodiversity #backyardbiodiversity #pollinators #pollinatorfriendly
Do you have a plan for rotating your dahlias from Do you have a plan for rotating your dahlias from year to year in your garden? 👩‍🌾 You don’t have to have a massive growing area to accomplish this! Simply switching ends of your growing space, interplanting other types of flowers or vegetables, or at least amending your soil with compost and nourishing your soil with a lovely overwintered cover crop can help keep your garden’s soil lively and healthy. Healthy soil supports healthy dahlias! 💐 🤔Did you know that farmers don’t grow the same crops on the same land year after year? It’s because different crops take different nutrients from the soil, and different crops attract different pests and diseases. When orchestrated carefully, crop rotation prevents soil and micro environmental stagnation. Here is our plan for increasing biodiversity on the farm and making sure we aren’t growing a monocrop: 🌱 We alternate walking aisles and dahlia beds every other year. 🌱 We intersperse hundreds of types of gorgeous annuals between dahlia varieties within the rows. (If you’d like to see our rows of dahlias and annuals in person, you should come to Dahlia Festival this year!) 🌱 We rotate out a blocks of the field to let sections rest from year to year. Last year we let the entire front field rest and planted only our back field. 👉Let us know in the comments what you’re doing to promote biodiversity in your own garden! #triplewrenfarms #sharebeauty #biodiversity #backyardbiodiversity #growingdahlias
Six gorgeous dahlias = one amazing combo! Happy we Six gorgeous dahlias = one amazing combo! Happy weekend, flower friends! #dahlias#dahliafarm#flowerfarmer#dahliatubers#hotpinkflowers#pinkdahlias#pnw
Over the next 6 weeks, dahlia growers like you wil Over the next 6 weeks, dahlia growers like you will be preparing garden beds and planting dahlia tubers all over the Northern Hemisphere. 🌱It’s so exciting! As you’re preparing, here are 4 of the most important things to consider when thinking about soil health. 🌿Make sure your soil has a loose or “fluffy” consistency. Loose soil gives your tubers space to grow under the ground, provides oxygen access to the expanding roots, can be penetrated by irrigation water, and supports all kinds of helpful subterranean creatures. 🪱 💦Make sure your soil drains well. Dahlias love growing in porous, sandy soil. Growing them in very heavy soil can allow too much water to sit around the tubers, potentially causing them to rot during the growing season. Be sure your garden is in an area that drains well, and is not too low or prone to collecting puddles. 🍂Make sure your soil has plenty of organic matter. If you do have heavy soil, consider adding in decaying leaves, compost, and/or sand. (Gardens with heavy clay-like soil should avoid adding only sand.) 👩‍🔬Don’t overthink it. If you want to be very scientific about your soil, you can pay a small fee and have your soil tested. However, most home gardeners don’t need this much information about their soil and it can be overwhelming trying to figure everything out, especially if you are a new dahlia grower. ✨If you’ve made sure your soil is loose, drains well, and you’ve added in some compost or organic material, you will have set yourself up for success. 💪 🪴Growing in raised beds, grow bags, or flower pots? The soil in raised beds should have the same qualities listed above. Raised beds hould be at least 12” deep and you can fill it with potting soil or 4-way soil from a local landscaping supplier in early spring. Large pots and grow bags can also be filled in the same way, just before planting in spring. Grow bags and pots tend to have warmer soil than garden beds because the heat from solar energy can more easily penetrate them. Dahlias in grow bags or pots will likely need to be watered more frequently than those planted right in the ground, and will likely benefit more from some afternoon shade.
1. Enjoy your dahlias! 💐 Dahlias really are a g 1. Enjoy your dahlias! 💐 Dahlias really are a gorgeous flower with so much variety. Don’t focus so much on figuring out how to grow them that you forget to marvel at their beauty. 🤩 2. Don’t plant too many the first year while you’re figuring everything out. Start with a few and then add more once you’ve figured out your growing conditions. Although, watch out! Dahlia Math is real. One day you have a dozen, and the next thing you know you’re growing many dozens. 😉 3. Plant in prepared soil that drains well. 🪴Dahlia tubers don’t like sitting in water, so well draining soil is important. 4. Dahlias need at least 8 hours of sun per day, but add mulch around them to keep their “feet” cool. ☀️ 5. Make a plan for watering in place from the very beginning. 💦 Once your dahlias start growing, they’ll need regular watering. 6. Cut your dahlia blooms frequently and deeply so they will produce even more blooms. ✂️ Remember that with dahlias, the more stems you cut, the more blooms your plants will give! For those of you who have grown dahlias before, what other essential tips would you add to this list? 🧑‍🌾 #triplewrenfarms #sharebeauty #newdahliagrower #dahlia #growingdahlias
We're right on the edge of the busiest part of our We're right on the edge of the busiest part of our year at the farm. We're about to ship close to ten thousand boxes of tubers and plants, and then we're hand-planting over 5 acres of tubers and seedlings! Two things that help ground me before a season of this kind of intense work are spending uninterrupted time with our family and taking time to be creative. The years I take time for this and "fill up my own cup" before giving out so much energy to our farm and customers, I come out on the other side of planting happier and healthier! So this week C and I are refreshing a mural (thank you @aliceingoldchains for painting it way back in 2017! 💛🌻) #creativity and then we took advantage of a day off school to sneak away to Friday Harbor for a few nights full of oysters and kayaks and Uno and feasting (of course w/ @sanjuanislandseasalt!) and reading and just soaking each other up. #family I feel tanked up and ready to tackle the last pieces of organization so that we can move a LOT of beauty into your hands, hearts and gardens in the next few weeks! #triplewrenfarms#sharebeauty#farmingfamily
We’ve been talking about garden planning all wee We’ve been talking about garden planning all week this week! We’ve talked about your WHY for growing flowers, conquering fear, and also starting big and working small. Today we’re going to talk about planning your space.   🌱Plan your space - Gardening space is a limited commodity, so make sure you have enough room for all of the dahlias and other plants you plan to grow. You’ll want to plan out adequate spacing, as well as taking into account the height of the dahlias. (If you’re growing Bloomquist Orion or Bloomquist York this year, they get tall!) It may be helpful to get out a sheet of graph paper and draw your space to scale and see how many plants you can reasonably fit. And then, if you’re like most flower gardeners, you’ll probably figure out a way fit a few more in there.😉 Don’t forget that you can forge foliage from your landscaping if you’re making bouquets! If you didn’t catch the other posts in this series, definitely go back and check it out in our Garden Plans highlight bubble on our profile. Where are you at with your garden planning? What are you most looking forward to this year in your flower garden?💐🌸 #triplewrenfarms #sharebeauty #gardenplanforsuccess #gardenplanning2025
Our U.S. tuber sale closes on Monday, March 24, an Our U.S. tuber sale closes on Monday, March 24, and 2025 shipping begins in April! It's finally spring, and summer flower season will be here before we know it. This weekend, you can grab any last-minute tubers, and get ready to watch your email for shipping announcements coming soon. 💌 P.S. Want to enjoy our dahlia fields in person this summer?? 2025 Festival tickets are also available now in our Online Store. #dahliatubers#dahliafarm#dahliafestivaltwf#sharebeauty#triplewrenfarms
⭐️Start big and work small⭐️ We say this ⭐️Start big and work small⭐️ We say this often at the farm because it’s the best way we’ve found to make a good plan. Start with your vision, then work backwards through the details. We talked earlier this week about your WHY for gardening and aligning your garden goals with your reason for gardening in the first place. Once you have that big picture figured out, you can start working through the details to figure out how to accomplish your goals. If you’re growing flowers as a side hustle, figure out how many bouquets you need to sell per week, and then plan according to that. If you’re growing for pure enjoyment, figure out which dahlias make you the happiest and grow lots of those. If you’d like to make bouquets for a special occasion, plan out your color scheme and work backwards from that. 💐 👉Have you ever tried this “start big, work small” way of planning? Or do you prefer a different way to plan your garden? Let us know in the comments! 🪴 #triplewrenfarms #sharebeauty #growingdahlias #gardenplanforsuccess #gardenplanning2025
Yesterday we talked about figuring out WHY you wa Yesterday we talked about figuring out WHY you want to garden and encouraged you to spend time thinking about your gardening goal(s). 👉The main thing I really want to challenge you with today is: don’t give in to fear. Don’t be afraid to plan or let yourself be frozen by fear of mistakes or failure or lost time or lost assets or even of investing in the wrong things! No matter your level of experience, it’s easy to be paralyzed by fear. I am afraid of different things now than I was in the beginning, but I *still* have to push aside my fear and decide that I’m going to make a plan. I’m going to fight towards making it happen with all my might. And I’m going to deal with the problems as they come up. ⭐️Start where you are. Make an educated plan for what you want to achieve, and then march forward. ⭐️ And remember those “whys” that we talked about yesterday? Those whys are incredibly important to the planning process! Right now, it might not feel like the most inspiring time to dig in—things might be muddy, the progress slow, and the rewards still far off. But this is the season of preparation, the time when the foundation is laid for a thriving garden. The effort you put in now—planning your space, building your soil—will make all the difference when the growing season hits full stride. Remembering the reason you are doing what you’re doing will help you to keep going when it gets difficult. So keep going—trust the process, do the behind-the-scenes work, and know that soon, you’ll step into a season of growth, watching your efforts come to life in a way that’s worth every moment of preparation. 🪴🌱💐 #triplewrenfarms #sharebeauty #gardenplanning #gardenplanning2025 #gardenplanforsuccess #growingdahlias
This week we’re talking all about garden plannin This week we’re talking all about garden planning! First I want to ask: WHY are you growing a garden? 🤔 Before you start deciding what to plant in your garden and where to plant it, it’s important to step back and think about your gardening goals. Figuring out why you garden is the key to finding fulfillment in gardening. I feel like in our culture, we talk a lot about finding a vision or clarifying mission statements for *businesses.* But on a *personal* level, I also find I get better results if I first think about why I want to do a project and then make decisions about exactly what the project will entail. I am generally more satisfied if I look at life through the lens of my WHY – my mission. For example: if I am gardening for pleasure, for stress relief, for “flower therapy,” then I need to look at what I’ll grow through the lens of what gives me joy – not what’s the most popular, or what brings my neighbor joy. If I have only a few hours a week to commit to my garden and my goal is to grow flowers for my home, then I need to look at how much I’ll grow through the lens of simply filling my kitchen table-vase (and maybe my neighbor’s too?!), not filling my entire backyard with a task that will eat up all my free time this summer. Make sense? 👉So let me challenge you today – do you know your “why”? Are you plowing along doing what you’ve always done in your garden, or doing the popular thing, or doing what you think others expect of you instead of making decisions through the lens of your specific vision for your garden efforts? It would be a gift to yourself to take an hour this week and try to refine your WHY for your garden, and then honestly look at your garden plans and decide if they match up. 🎁 Once you have your primary goals/motives, you can outline more specific steps. I will expand on this later this week, but in the meantime I encourage you to figure out your goals! #gardenplanning #gardenplanning2025 #gardenplanforsuccess #triplewrenfarms #sharebeauty
Our Canadian Dahlia Tuber Sale is happening now! W Our Canadian Dahlia Tuber Sale is happening now! We have over 40 beautiful dahlia varieties to choose from, including all of the dahlias in this reel. Head over to triplewrensfarms.ca to shop now! Dahlia tubers will ship from our Bristish Columbia farm in April, so no phytosanitary certificate is needed. #canadiandahlias #canadianflowers #canadiandahliatubers #triplewrenfarms #sharebeauty
Our Canadian Dahlia Tuber Sale is happening now! 🇨🇦💐 We have over 40 beautiful dahlia varieties to choose from, including all of the dahlias in this reel. Head over to triplewrensfarms.ca to shop now! Dahlia tubers will ship from our Bristish Columbia farm in April, so no phytosanitary certificate is needed. #canadiandahlias #canadianflowers #triplewrenfarms #sharebeauty #canadadahlias
All the dahlias we enjoy in our gardens today were All the dahlias we enjoy in our gardens today were once seedlings in a hopeful grower’s garden. 🌱 Here at Triple Wren we save (and sell - see our online store!) dahlia seeds from our fields, grow them on, carefully analyze, and look for new, beautiful varieties to save tubers from and enjoy! If you grow dahlias, you too can make a plan to save your own seeds this year to grow in spring/summer 2026! See our Dahlia Seeds highlight on our profile to learn more. 🌱 #dahliaseeds#dahliafarm#flowerfarmer#sharebeauty#triplewrenfarms#flatlay
Hey friends! Let's talk about dahlia seeds. This Hey friends! Let's talk about dahlia seeds. This week we're starting seeds we saved because in just about 8 weeks, I want to plant them out in our field. Dahlias have so much genetic variety that seedlings don't usually look exactly like their parent plants. They do, however, carry traits from their pollen-parent and seed-parents. This summer we're planting seed we saved from over 60 named varieties here at the farm, and I'm really looking forward to showing you what grows. 💐 Many of you will be growing those seeds too - I know because we just shipped out a LOT of packets to you this week! Thank you so much for buying seeds from Triple Wren this year. Truly, you blew us away with your support. 🥹 The past few weeks, we've been talking a lot about our amazing Novice Hybridizers, and all of them and all of our Legacy Hybridizers started their dahlias from seeds. In fact, almost* every dahlia you love started from a seed! Dahlia creators rely on seed crossings as a core piece of their creative process. This summer here in Ferndale and also in Abbotsford, BC we're growing tons of seed saved by Steve and Sandy Boley of Birch Bay dahlias, seed from Ken Greenway of AC Dahlias, and trialing new named dahlias from Noni Morrison who makes Salish dahlias, and of course new dahlias from Paul Bloomquist. We're growing lots of Svartnäsets Nougat from Sara @fruperenn, Carpe Dahlia Sangria, Harvest, and Summer Blush from Beckie @carpedahlia, Finch's Cornman from Alex @Finchflorals, PK Bloodshot from Jess at @pkdahlias, Dawn's Early Light from Dawn @whistlingbeeflowerfarm and more too - there is going to be SO much beauty here at the farm! If you make it out to one of our Dahlia festival evenings in September, you'll be able to see all this beauty with your own eyes, but also we'll be cataloging as much as we can here on Instagram. Thank you for following along on our adventures here at Triple Wren, and keep watching to see what we grow! #dahliafarm#dahliaseeds#dahliatubers#flowerfarmer#flowerfarm#triplewrenfarms#sharebeauty
Here are 3 questions we are frequently asked about Here are 3 questions we are frequently asked about growing dahlias from seeds:🌱 Question: Do dahlia seedlings bloom the first year? Answer: Ohhh yes! Sometimes our seedlings bloom before our tuber-planted dahlias. They will get to be the size of a full grown dahlia plant.   Question: Will these seeds grow flowers that look like the dahlias that produced the seed? Answer: No, not usually! Dahlias have 8 sets of chromosomes, which means they have some marvelous genetic diversity. The seeds from one “mother” seed pod might make flowers which all look dramatically different from each other depending on their pollen “fathers.” You can control the outcome of pollination somewhat by hand-pollinating and physically protecting a bloom from natural pollinators and/or by only growing certain forms in your garden.   Question: Do dahlia seedlings make tubers? Answer: Yes! Depending on their vigor, seedlings might make a small or even a huge tuber clump by the end of season. If you judge a seedling to be a “keeper,” you can harvest and store its tubers, then replant the following year to continue observing the blooms. If you’d like to learn more about this topic, head over to our blog and type “seeds” into the search bar. (Link in bio) we’ll post some links in our Stories today too. #dahliaseeds #growingdahliasfromseed #triplewrenfarms #sharebeauty
Once upon a time… all these dahlias were seedlin Once upon a time… all these dahlias were seedlings in a hopeful gardener’s garden. 🌱 Just look at them now!! Have you ever grown dahlias from seed? Unlike dahlias from tubers (which are clones of their “mother”) each dahlia seed will grow a unique, brand-new variety. Every dahlia seed has the potential to grow and bloom in a huge variety of colors, forms, and other characteristics, because dahlias have more sets of chromosomes than most other plants. I remember looking at dahlias in my Mima’s garden when I was tiny, and wondering how such crazy-different blooms could all be called dahlias🤔…. And now we know! 💡 👉Will you grow dahlias from seed this year? If you’d like to try growing dahlia seeds, we still have a few packets of dahlia seeds left in our online shop. Head over there and check it out. (Link in bio) Dahlia seeds will start shipping this week! 🌱 #sharebeauty #triplewrenfarms #dahliaseeds #dahliaseedsforsale #growingdahlias
There are still a few packets left in our Winter S There are still a few packets left in our Winter Seed sale! Shipping this week to U.S. addresses. You can grow your own unique hybrids this summer. 🌱 See our stories more for info! 🥰💐#dahliaseeds#dahliafarm#dahliahybridizing#triplewrenfarms
There are so many reasons to plant dahlia seeds! T There are so many reasons to plant dahlia seeds! They make lots of beautiful flowers the first year, they are incredibly diverse, they quickly grow tubers in case you want to save a special new hybrid… learn more about growing dahlias from seed v tubers from the blog link in our stories! #dahliaseeds#dahliahybridizing #dahliahybridising #dahliafarm #triplewrenfarms #plantsofinstagram #asmr
We’re having our annual dahlia seed sale right We’re having our annual dahlia seed sale right now! Have you ever thought about how your favorite dahlia varieties first grew? Dahlias reproduce themselves in two ways. 1. They produce gorgeous flowers that can make seeds, and 2. They produce amazing tubers. There is one huge difference between these two: The tubers will produce clones/copies of their “mother” plants, but the seeds will not.  At Triple Wren, we love growing thousands of seedlings every year. We’re looking for special “keeper” varieties, but we also enjoy the thrill of knowing we are growing dahlias that don’t exist anywhere else in the whole, wide world. Do you grow dahlia seeds? We’re having our annual seed sale right now, and in 2024 we saved enough seed from specific seed-parents at the farm that we are offering seed from about 40 dahlia varieties alongside our amazing dahlia seed mixes. I’m so excited about growing these seed parent-specific varieties this summer and showing you what kind of blooms we get, and I hope that you’ll grab some to grow as well so that you can create your own unique beauty! #dahliaseeds #triplewrenfarms #sharebeauty #growingdahliasfromseed #growingdahlias
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