Dahlia Dinnerplate Otto's Thrill

I ordered Otto’s Thrill, Thomas Edison, and Belle of Barmera this year. Last year I ordered Café Au Lait, and only two of three tubers grew. I did let Longfield Garden know about it. I really didn’t want my money back, but they refunded the entire Café Au Lait purchase. I thought, well, I’ll give them a try this year. I received nine clumps, 3 of each variety, Just about all of the necks were broken. I was able to get seven small tubers, out of the clumps, that looked like they had an eye and were still attached to the crown. I potted those. Only three of them sent up a sprout. The other four either rotted or did nothing. Fortunately, one of each variety survived. Once again, I told Longfield Garden about it. I did not actually want a replacement, but they sent one anyhow. I just thought they may want to know what the customer experience was. Anyhow, I figured I’d give the replacements to the gardeners in our garden club. I did not imagine anything could be worse than the first order, but the replacement was. All broken necks. Five completely rotted crowns, and only three knots that might perform. I potted the three. Two have a sprout, so I’ll give them away at some point. The other rotted in the pot, no sprout, so I’m assuming no eye in the knot. So, out of a total of 21 clumps that I purchased/received between last summer and now, I have seven plants. I should think someone should be embarrassed to hold themselves out as a grower, and then ship people something that is so badly damaged and uncared for. I don’t want my money back, and I don’t want any more clumps/tubers from Longfield. I did find a site where people wrote reviews, and they had the same experience as me. I won’t provide the link because, seeing all the “five-star” reviews on the Longfield site, I would imagine that someone would work to have the honest reviews removed. I only purchased from Longfield because Laura on Garden Answer seemed to get some great results with Longfield’s tubers, and also The Impatient Gardener was touting them. I assume those folks were given clumps that passed a quality control inspection because of their web presence. Anyhow, I’ll go back to better growers.