2023 in review

It’s the end of October and next year has already been on my mind for weeks, if not months. But before time and memory get away from me I wanted to take some time to document my thoughts on the past growing season. For posterity, for interest’s sake, I’m not sure (does anyone even read blogs anymore?). What I do know is that writing my thoughts and experiences down helps me immensely with future planning, so this is as much for you, the reader, as it is for me! :)

As we all likely remember, spring 2023 started off with a bang…in the worst way possible. Years one and two brought more seasonal temps and growing tulips as a cut flower seemed an entirely reasonable thing to do, however unseasonably warm temperatures in early spring the last two years have made me question their long-time viability. While I have no plans of abandoning spring crops anytime soon, I do wonder about their future in an ever-changing climate. Tulips, along with ranunculus and other cool-loving crops, need a nice, slow wake-up in spring. Jumping from late winter temps to mid-summer temps within a week is, as you can imagine, hard on the plants. Despite my attempts to keep the tulips shaded out, the soaring temps sent thousands upon thousands of tulips racing to colour up and bloom, all at the same time. This might seem ideal, but the key to growing tulips as cuts is that they need to be harvested at a particular stage or their storage capacity becomes limited or, worse, null and void. In short, this year’s tulip “season” was incredibly hectic, physically exhausting (think 12+ hour days of bending, pulling, rinsing & wrapping) and just a little bit heartbreaking. In total, we lost about a thousand to the heat. Each winter, as spring nears, I feel a strange mix of dread and excitment; the former because tulips are an incredibly labour-intensive crop and push me to my physical limits, and the latter because they’re one of the most beautiful flowers we grow here.

This early heat isn’t just hard on the spring crops, but the thousands of delicate seedlings that are planted out in mid-May. As much as seedlings (depending on the variety) dislike cool soil temps, they also don’t respond well to high temperatures while establishing root systems. Due to this year’s early heat many typically-reliable plants failed to thrive throughout the growing season; phlox, statice, agrostemma, lace flower and other greenery were just some of the flowers that didn’t fare well due to their stressful start in life.

Here are some other random lessons learned from our fourth season:

Dahlias - In 2022 I lost all my tubers in storage, but had ordered more as back-up. I concluded that in order to continue growing dahlias I had to minimize the number of varieties, grow at least 100 of each and stick to ball dahlias (which suffer the least amount of bug damage, boast the longest vase life and store well over the winter). In 2023 this worked well - I have some standout varieties, like Cornel Brons, that I’ll continue to grow lots of and some I decided to cut from production.

Lisianthus - Lisianthus get a bad rap for being hard to grow, but if you have the time, patience, space and right conditions they’re well worth the effort. By late December/early January, I’m itching to get my hands back “in the dirt,” and starting lisianthus from seed is a welcome task during the darkest days of winter. They are susceptible to Fusarium wilt, a disease caused by fungi present in all soils. (Fusarium solani and Fusarium oxysporum, in particular.) Here we’ve lost a small percentage every year, so to combat this we seed more than needed, rotate crop locations and keep varieties separated to avoid spread.

Ranunculus - Hands down, ranunculus are the most popular flower we grow here. While not a particularly difficult flower to grow, they are labour-intensive and particular about their growing conditions. Here we soak and sprout our ranunculus in mid-February, and after a few weeks of growth they’re hardened off before being transplanted into the greenhouse in March. From there the fluctuating temperatures of late March and April mean frequent covering and uncovering to ensure they’re neither too hot during the day or too cold at night. Once the warm, sunny days of May hit, now it swings to making sure these cool-loving flowers don’t dry out or get blasted from the sun.

Did I say they weren’t difficult to grow? ;)

Plants we’re not growing in 2024: gladiolus, cress, bunny tails (as cute as they are, harvesting is a nightmare), gomphrena, xeranthemum

Plants we’re growing less of in 2024: statice, snapdragons

Plants we’re growing more of in 2024: Greenery. So much greenery. It’s the best advice out there for flower farmers and it’s repeated often for a reason. You can never have too much. (Here we focus on mint, geranium, basil, sweet Annie, cerinthe, bupleurum, Euphorbia, & Eucalyptus.)

Plants we’re trying for the first time in 2024: Roses, forget-me-not (pink/blue), calla lillies, salpiglossis, geranium (foliage), greenhouse tomatoes

While year four was certainly our most challenging in terms of weather, disease and pest-pressure, it was also our busiest! We welcomed over 100 subscribers to our spring and summer subscriptions, finished our greenhouse/cooler project, constructed and completed our new 30 x 40 ft greenhouse and provided flowers for seven weddings in 2024. Thanks again to our subscribers and fellow business owners, who have supported us in various ways over the last four years. I’m so excited to see what year five has in store!