Lots of couples fight over the big stuff: money, kids, infidelity.

But flowers?

If you could see the riotous, ruffled dahlias at Endless Summer Flower Farm in Camden, you’d understand: Some things are worth the fight. On a recent morning, Karen Clark stood under an awning near dozens of raised beds, arranging the flowers her husband, Phil, picked only hours before. She plucked a small pink bloom from a bouquet and turned to him.

“Did you put this one in there?” she asked, shaking her head. “It’s a little sad for me. It looks a little sad.”

“We’re both fussy,” Phil told a visitor, giving his wife a sidelong glance, “but she’s a little over the top. I call her the flower Nazi.”

It’s not quite that bad, but both of the Clarks are exacting about their dahlias, and their attention to detail has paid off. Most days, their self-service, roadside flower cart sells out of bouquets before noon – no matter that they’re way off the main drag. They’ve become a favorite stop on the town’s prestigious garden tour. Rebecca Sawyer-Fay and Lynn Karlin of “Gardens: Maine Style” fame even did a feature on the farm for Country Living Gardener magazine. The framed article hangs in the Clarks’ kitchen.

Still, they’re humble about their flower power.

“I don’t have any flower training,” Karen said.

“We just do what we do,” Phil added.

The Clarks’ dahlia days began nine years ago in preparation for the autumn wedding of one of their daughters. They hired a florist, but decided to grow a few dahlias of their own for the reception. Except “a few” was 150 plants’ worth. Dahlias are incredibly prolific – they bear flowers until mid-October, and the more you cut them, the more they produce – so the Clarks built a flower cart and sold bouquets in tin cans for “a whopping” $3 apiece.

“We could pick everything in sight, and when we woke up, we had flowers in the morning,” Phil recalled. “We didn’t really know much about flowers.”

That’s not the case anymore. Today, the Clarks grow about 150 different varieties, and this spring, Phil planted about 2,600 tubers in raised beds and on an acre garden plot beside their home. The couple sell cut flowers at their stand (bouquets now cost $14) and to florists and caterers, and they sell anywhere from 8,000 to 10,000 tubers annually to gardeners online and at the farm.

The flower business allowed Phil, now 62, to retire early from his job as an offset printer. Karen, 58, still works at a local law office, and though she doesn’t always love getting up at 5 a.m. to pick dahlias, she wouldn’t have it any other way.

“If we could come back young again, this would’ve been our vocation,” Karen said. “It’s wonderful.”

Monarch butterflies danced in the air as the couple strolled between rows in the garden. When Karen touched a showy blossom called Western Spanish Dancer, a grasshopper leapt out from the foliage.

“We’re not supposed to allow grasshoppers out here, but we do,” Karen said.

“I don’t,” Phil retorted.

“You do, too!” Karen said.

Karen, a self-proclaimed “nature nut,” paused at a ruffled red bloom that looked like a crepe-paper ball. She moved the petals to reveal a goldfinch’s hidden stash.

“We feed them sunflower seeds and they tuck them all in,” Karen said.

Every few feet, Phil or Karen would stop to point out a favorite – the huge, peachy pink Belle of Barmera, which resembles a shaggy sheepdog’s head. The red, roselike Jerry Garcia. The yellow-tipped crimson firecracker called Hy Lobster.

“They’re all gorgeous,” Phil said. “It’s just that some are more gorgeous than others.”

Regardless of shape, size or color, they all have one thing in common: every single flower is perfect. Blemished blossoms don’t make the cut.

“In the old days, we used to throw our discards on the ground and people used to follow us around and stuff them in their shirts,” Karen said. “We have the prettiest compost in town.”

As she cleaned up the rows, snapping off small flower heads – “sacrifices” for a larger, longer-stemmed bloom – something caught her eye. A velvety, deep burgundy blossom that was destined for a bouquet had somehow ended up on the ground. Karen stopped to pick it up.

“Phil!” she exclaimed. “Did that fall out? Oh my goodness! That’s Dark Magic.”

Phil shrugged, looking resigned, but happy.

“That’s the only thing we fight about,” he said. “The flowers.”

Endless Summer Flower Farm is located at 57 East Fork Road in Camden. For directions, planting tips or to order tubers, visit www.endlesssummerflowerfarm.com or call 236-8752.

Phil’s tips for fall tuber care

In the basement of Phil and Karen Clark’s Camden home, hundreds of clear plastic shoeboxes line the walls, holding anywhere from 8,000 to 10,000 dahlia tubers in the winter months.

. Do not dig before Oct. 15.

. After a killing frost, chop the plant down, leaving a 6-inch stem to use as a “handle.”

. Tie a label to the “handle” with each dahlia’s name.

. With a spade, dig around the entire plant about 1 foot from the stalk.

. Carefully lift tuber clump with the spade. Set clump aside to dry for a few hours, then remove excess dirt.

. On a screen, wash tubers.

. Divide and label.

. Treat with fungicide, if you prefer. Phil recommends mixing 1 cup sulphur powder with 8 quarts vermiculite. After tubers have been washed and labeled, dip them into the mixture until coated.

. Store in a cool, dry place (35 to 50 degrees F). They may be stored in shavings, peat moss, sand, sawdust or vermiculite, but the Clarks wrap theirs in plastic wrap, such as Saran wrap.

BANGOR DAILY NEWS PHOTO BY JOSHUA BRIGHT

Phil Clark pulls a cart full of freshly cut dahlias back to the house from the field at Endless Summer Flower Farm in Camden.