When you first arrive at the Online Configuration Guide (OCG), all (more than 10,000) the ADS registered cultivars are queued up at the bottom of the screen in more or less alphabetical order. This is not very useful. So you will want to enter some criteria to limit the number of cultivars listed. Here are the major criterion you may choose:
Cultivar
Enter a specific name or part of a name, upper/lower case doesn’t matter. If you are familiar with wildcards (used by some search programs), don’t user them!
Let’s say you are looking for Hollyhill Black Beauty but your don’t remember the Hollyhill part of the name. Just enter black beauty and the cultivar Hollyhill Black Beauty will be listed for you. If you accidentally misspelled beauty you would not get any cultivars listed. You might notice the misspelling, but if not, try typing the simplest part of the name, black.
Class
You may enter the 4 digit classification code and you will retrieve cultivars that fall into that classification code.
Size
Use the drop down menu to select one or more sizes to use in the search. Please remember, sizes only pair with certain forms (FD, ID, SC, C, IC, LC) so if you choose AA for size and ST (Stellar) for form you won’t get any cultivars listed.
Form
Use the drop down menu to choose one or more forms to use in the search.
Color
Use the drop down menu to choose one or more colors to use in the search.
Logic Considerations:
If you choose more than one major criterion, you will only list cultivars that match all the criteria chosen. For example, if you choose AA for size and red for color you will only list cultivars that are AA and red.
If you choose multiple options on a drop down menu you will list cultivars that match any of the options. For example, if you choose options A and AA under size you will cultivars that are either A or AA.
A compound example would work like this. If you choose A , AA under size and DR, L under color, you will list cultivars that are (A or AA) and (DR or L).
Try it!! It is much easier than it sounds!!
Once you have your list of cultivars, you will see all the information for each cultivar even if an info item was not part or your search. If you see a camera icon, click on the camera to see a picture of the cultivar. Close the tab for the picture to get back to the OCG.
Miscellaneous Notes:
If you don’t see a choice in the drop down it means that currently there are not any cultivars that match that criteria. For example, there are many forms defined for micro dahlias, but since they are new there are not cultivars in every defined form (yet).
On any drop down menu you can click on a checkmark to “uncheck” the value.
The basis for your search is the entire Composite Listing 1976 – present (more than 10,000 cultivars). Only ADS registered dahlias are included.