One of the more justified criticisms of this column is that it is often hard on plants that many readers love.
Over the years, there’s been no holding back in the criticism of begonias, leylandii, cordyline, Pieris ‘Forest Flame’ and even, intermittently, hydrangeas.
With begonias, it’s obvious – the shapelessness and garish colours aggravate me – whereas with the latter entries it’s their ubiquity, which I surmise is down to laziness or a lack of imagination. Part of this column’s role is to advise, and in this case, the advice is simple: avoid begonias, leylandii, cordyline, Pieris ‘Forest Flame’ and hydrangeas, unless it’s a lace cap variety.
To this ignominious inventory you can add dahlias.
This was a plant I grew up with. The striking colours and intricate patterns of the dahlias’ flowers were a mainstay our family garden back in the 1970s; the tubers of varieties whose names are long forgotten overwintered in the void beneath the floorboards that us kids used as a den.
Perhaps it was this familiarity that bred the contempt but more likely it’s down to the bewildering number of varieties and the array of bright colour combinations – plus the little bit of effort you have to put in year-to-year. Previously, this column has described the typical dahlia flower as “reminiscent of Strictly Come Dancing viewed through a kaleidoscope after consuming copious amounts of LSD”.
It could just be coincidence but dahlias are native to Mexico, home of payote, the hallucigenic plant that was a favourite with surrealist Salvador Dalí, the Grateful Dead’s Jerry Garcia and beat poet Allen Ginsberg.
It’s important to qualify my sweeping disdain for the dahlia, however, by pointing out that not every variety is deserving of it – there’s one exception that proves the rule.
Bishop of Llandaff isn’t like other dahlias. For starters, the petals on the single to semi-double flowers are all one colour – an eye-catching, some say jaw-dropping, deep red, with bright yellow anthers at the centre.
The foliage is also noteworthy – dark bronze-green foliage, that the more romantic may describe as ‘chocolatey’.
It’s a lethal combination and a late summer, early autumn sight that’s hard to tire of.
A favourite for cut flower displays, ‘Bishop of Llandaff’ has a long-standing RHS Award of Garden Merit (AGM), and is suitable for both containers and borders. It’s important to point out that other ‘Bishops’ are available – including ‘Oxford’, ‘Canterbury’ and ‘Auckland’ – but ‘Llandaff’ is by far the gardening congregation’s favourite.
Bred a century ago, it was named in honour of Joshua Pritchard Hughes, the then bishop of the diocese of Llandaff in south Wales.
Like all dahlias, the Bishop is grown from a tuber that is dormant from late autumn through to early summer. The plants are surprisingly robust and reliable but the young emerging leaves are susceptible to slug and snail attack.
The dormant tubers will rot if exposed to prolonged cold or excessive damp, which is why there’s a tradition of lifting and storing them over the colder months. This is how you buy them in the spring, when they look like a withered spud.
For those reluctant to lift, an upturned plant pot placed on the ground above the overwintering tuber will reduce the likelihood of rotting.
