The dahlia ‘Dark Spirit’ has flowers in the darkest of reds, almost black and with the same softness as a velvet curtain in an old cinema. With small perfect ball shaped flowers. A lot of retailers name them as ‘Ball dahlia’ or ‘Pompom’. Although according to the Swedish Dahlia society they belong to the group ‘Decorative’. It is the composite flowers pointed tipped petals that definitely put it in the decorative group rather than ball or pompom where the petals have a rounded tip. This is a Dahlia that I fell head over heals for and decided to keep. I try new varieties every year and it is far from all that I end up keeping. If you don’t want to store the bulbs through the winter you can always treat them as a seasonal flower and buy new bulbs each year.

  • Group: Decorative
  • Height: 75-100 cm ( it did not grow this tall for me the first year)
  • Size of flower: approx. 7-8 cm
  • Colour: Deep dark red, almost black

A visitation by the frost

Dahlias cannot survive below zero degrees and the bulbs needs to be frost free throughout the winter. But as long as the bulb does not freeze it can survive the first frost. Meaning, it does not matter if the petals freeze.