Black fly dont like my white dahlias....BUT LOVE THE RED !!

[Minty]

Hi all. Is there any explanation to this ?.
6 weeks ago i bought a pack of 6 mixed colour dahlias, they had no flowers or buds at the time. They were planted in to two terracotta pots. Whats the chances of me planting all white in one and the reds in another ???????. Well as you may guess this is exactly what i did.
Heres the confusing bit, although they are both flowering healthily the reds are covered in blackfly whereas the whites are completely clear, now being as the pots are less than 3 foot apart surely they both should be infested.
Curiosity gets the better of me, does anyone know why ?,
Thanks Minty

[Snadger]

No idea why Minty, maybe they think they will stand out more and be prey to predators more easily on white ?

Some folk won't eat white bread?
Some people prefer red meat to chicken?

What I would like to know is why do predators always attack the plants you grow, and leave the nice juicy weeds alone?

One of lifes imponderables I suppose!

[Alice]

Hello Minty, I spent part of my psychology degree on the the study of odds (of no interest to me). All I remember is the odds on you planting all the reds in one pot and all the whites in the other are much shorter than you would think.
As for the blackfly attacking one more than the other - well, can only assume they like them better for some reason. I'm sure some of our botanist grapes can explain. While they're at it , can they tell me why the squirrels attacked my yellow roses but never touched the others. They just picked the flowers off the yellow ones. I don't grow yellow ones anymore. They never touch the others.

[nick the grief]

Some varietied of a plant are more suseptable to pest than other. My Aquadulce broad beans had blackfly on them even though they were planted in November where as the Crimson flowered ones that are being grown for seed don't have a one but have been nibbled by slugs, I guess the moral of the story is only grow WHite ones