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Ep.23: Flower Farming And Sustainable Floral Design: An Interview with Farmer-Florist Heather Staten
2.2k Plays1 year ago
Are you curious about what it takes to be a sustainable farmer-florist? In episode 23, we delve into the vibrant world of flower farming with Heather Staten from Heather's Flower Farm in Hood River, Oregon. Heather's journey from an avid gardener to flourishing flower farmer is a testament to her love for the earth and the beauty of cultivation.
In this episode, Heather shares her passion for growing over 250 varieties of flowers and foliage on her family's 18-acre property in Hood River, Oregon. From her commitment to sustainability, using no-till techniques and natural fertilizers, to her dedication to reducing the floral industry's carbon footprint, Heather's Flower Farm is a true example of eco-friendly flower farming.
Discover how Heather's flower farm is a family endeavor, with her husband, Ben, crafting the farm's infrastructure, and their children, Lottie and Jake, actively involved in the field and design. From weddings and events to bouquet subscriptions and farmer's markets, Heather's business model showcases the beauty and joy of locally grown flowers as a sustainable alternative to imported blooms.
Join us in this episode as we explore Heather's insights into the world of flowers, her tips for successful cut flower growing, and the joy of connecting with the season through blooms. Tune in to hear about her unique approach to bouquet subscriptions, the art of floral design, and the beauty of foraging for greenery on her picturesque property.
In This Episode You'll Hear About:
- 00:02:36 - Heather's journey into flower farming
- 00:06:02 - Overview of Heather's business model
- 00:08:42 - Heather's approach to full-service weddings
- 00:14:38 - The value of investing in floral education
- 00:26:44 - Sustainability practices in the wedding industry
- 00:29:39 - Building a hoop house for flower farming
- 00:30:25 - Forcing tulips in a hoop house
- 00:31:57 - Benefits of growing perennials for flower farming
- 00:35:50 - CSA bouquet subscriptions
- 00:43:23 - Benefits of growing perennials for sustainable flower farming
- 00:46:16 - Utilizing foraged greenery for floral arrangements
- 00:50:48 - Importance of local flowers
- 00:53:19 - Family involvement in Heather's flower farm
Shownotes: https://thefloweringfarmhouse.com/2024/05/28/ep-23-farmer-florist-heather-staten-heathers-flower-farm/
Learn More About Heather’s Flower Farm:
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Transcript
Introduction and Host Background
00:00:02
Speaker
Welcome to the Backyard Bouquet podcast, where stories bloom from local flower fields and home gardens. I'm your host, Jennifer Galitzia of the Flowering Farmhouse. I'm a backyard gardener turned flower farmer located in Hood River, Oregon. Join us for heartfelt journeys shared by flower farmers and backyard gardeners.
Podcast Mission and Invitation
00:00:22
Speaker
Each episode is like a vibrant garden, cultivating wisdom and joy through flowers. From growing your own backyard garden to supporting your local flower farmer,
00:00:32
Speaker
The backyard bouquet is your fertile ground for heartwarming tales and expert cut flower growing advice. All right flower friends, grab your gardening gloves, garden snips, or your favorite vase because it's time to let your backyard bloom.
00:00:55
Speaker
Welcome back to the Backyard Bouquet podcast.
Guest Introduction: Heather Staton
00:00:58
Speaker
Today, I'm thrilled to introduce a very special guest, my friend Heather Staton from Heather's Flower Farm. Nestled in the stunning Hood River Valley, Heather has turned her passion for gardening into a flourishing flower farm that spans an acre on her family's 18-acre property.
00:01:17
Speaker
From her first row of zinnias as a little girl to now growing over 250 varieties of flowers and foliage, Heather's journey is a testament to her love for the earth and the magic of cultivation.
Sustainable Flower Farming Practices
00:01:30
Speaker
At Heather's Flower Farm, sustainability isn't just a buzzword, it's a way of life. Heather and her family use no-tilt techniques and natural fertilizers to enrich their soil
00:01:42
Speaker
ensuring that their fields are not only bursting with blooms, but also buzzing with life from bees to beneficial insects. What's truly special about Heather is her commitment to reducing the floral industry's carbon footprint, providing locally grown flowers as a beautiful alternative to imported blooms. Along with her husband, Ben, who crafts the farms infrastructure, and their children, Lottie and Jake, who are hands on in the field and design, Heather's Flower Farm is a true family endeavor.
00:02:12
Speaker
So whether you're a floral enthusiast or someone who's passionate about sustainable agriculture, you're in for a treat today as we dive into Heather's world of flowers. Heather, welcome to the show. I'm so excited to have you share your story and insights with us today. Thanks, Jen. I'm thrilled to be here. You are one of my oldest flower friends and you know I love talking about flowers, so this is going to be a fun talk.
00:02:36
Speaker
This is going to be so fun. And for all of you joining us today, I know you can't see us, but Heather and I are sitting next to each other at my dining room table because we live about 15 minutes from each other. So this is going to be really fun to chat with an old friend and fill you guys in on Heather's story and how she got started.
Heather's Journey to Flower Farming
00:02:56
Speaker
So Heather, if you don't mind, can you tell us how did you fall into flower farming?
00:03:01
Speaker
No, I was an avid gardener for many, many years. My parents always had big vegetable gardens. And then my mother-in-law is English. And I spent some time living in England. And you know, the English are just amazing gardeners. And I was very inspired by her. And so I always had gardens around the house. And then at a certain stage, I decided I liked having flowers in the house.
00:03:30
Speaker
But I didn't like cutting them from the landscape because then I would have holes left. And was just sort of googling cut flowers and discovered floret and fell down the rabbit hole of cut flower farming. I bought Aaron's original book.
00:03:52
Speaker
you know, eight years ago, started with a few rows of cut flowers and every year have just gotten bigger and fell down. And now I have a kind of full time business growing and arranging cut flowers. It's, as you know,
00:04:12
Speaker
a thing that is easy to become passionate about. There's something about handling flowers, growing flowers that just lights me up. It really fulfills me so. It really does. I've talked with so many guests about how flowers really feed our soul. And I'm not sure whether we're feeding people souls more or we're feeding ourselves or
00:04:34
Speaker
Maybe it's both, but there's just something really magical and special and the bonds we create in this industry, just like we're sitting here having our tea and coffee and getting to chat about flowers. I mean, how special is that?
00:04:49
Speaker
You, did you start with an acre of flowers or when you finally went down that rabbit hole? No, it's been, this is the seventh year and the first year was just a couple rows, you know, it was 20 plants of this and 20 plants of that.
00:05:05
Speaker
And even that gave me more flowers than I needed for myself. And so I had a little bouquet subscription with 10 friends that I delivered to once a week. And then every year since then, it's expanded. And now it's an acre under production. Which is a lot. Which is a lot. And especially as intensely as we grow.
00:05:26
Speaker
We do a lot of succession planting and interplanning and I have very, very tiny pathways because I just need room for all the flowers and it's crammed in there. We grow a lot. I have seen your space and you really do cram a lot, which I think was an inspiration for me as we were downsizing our farm and just having to use what we have this year on a quarter acre.
00:05:47
Speaker
And it made me realize, okay, Heather has really tiny walkways, I can squeeze through some pretty tight spaces here. So I've definitely narrowed my pathways after seeing your space. So what is your business
Business Model and Wedding Floristry
00:05:59
Speaker
model? Where do your flowers go now? So we are about maybe 60% weddings and events. And then the remainder, I have a
00:06:08
Speaker
50 person bouquet subscription. And then do a little bit of farmer's market in the off season months in the winter time. And then I've got a little local organic grocery store that we sell bouquets to. That's a lot of channels that you're managing. Do you do that by yourself? No, I've got a couple of part time employees. I do rely on my family a lot who are really good sports in encouraging me. Yeah, it's
00:06:38
Speaker
At that level, it does, you can do it yourself. Drive yourself into the job. Yeah, especially the weddings. You need to have like a lot of hands on deck. And for the weddings, I also, I utilize my farmer friends too because I can't, it's a really big wedding. I can't grow enough for that. So I bought dahlias and other things from you. Yeah. Which is awesome. And I appreciate that you stick with the local flowers versus using something imported.
00:07:07
Speaker
you've always been really good about calling and asking what I have that goes with your palettes. So you said 50 to 60% of your business is weddings? About how many weddings do you do a year? Last year I did 40, which was too many. That's a lot, yeah. I was at the end of my rope by the end of last year. So I'm doing less, but sort of bigger or more intentional this year. I'm not saying yes to everything. So when you,
00:07:35
Speaker
Do the weddings, are you just providing buckets to the clients or what are your wedding packages entail as a flower farmer or you're more of a flower farmer florist, is that correct?
00:07:47
Speaker
I do do some DIY buckets. I also do what we call a la carte weddings where people will order off a list of arrangements. I'm going to buy them okay and three boutonnieres and pick those up at the farm. Then we also do full service weddings. My intent is to do more full service because I really love the floristry part of it and the place where you can most express
00:08:16
Speaker
your artistry and create a complete sort of floral vision and really let your imagination kind of run wild is in the full service weddings. I think you've got the most opportunity that way. They're also the most work because you have the installation and the breakdown and it's a lot of time away from the farm, but they're the things that I get most excited about. That's really neat. Now, how did you get started with
00:08:45
Speaker
the weddings because weddings demand a lot. I was a wedding photographer for many years. So I've seen the other side of the weddings of capturing all the details. And as the farmer florist, there's a lot of work that goes into
00:09:02
Speaker
making those weddings beautiful for the photographer to photograph or the guest to enjoy. So how did you get started with weddings? Well, I definitely took classes. It was not a field that I knew about. And there's a lot of technical things on weddings that you don't necessarily think about. But you know, it can be really hot here in the summertime. And so
00:09:29
Speaker
selecting the correct blooms for dealing with the weather conditions or the thing that's classic and the gorgeous. We're sitting here looking out on a really windy day. It's so windy here. And you've got to pick the right kind of vases and stabilize things so that
00:09:47
Speaker
I did do, I've got to say, like early on, I had a wedding where I was watching all the bud vases on the tables flop over and there's nothing more unnerving than watching vases, you know, tumble over. It really, it ruins your day for sure. But you don't make that mistake more than once.
00:10:04
Speaker
Yes, most mistakes in farming you make one time, you learn your lesson. I know it's interesting that you say that because when I was the wedding photographer, I got the other perspective. And when I used a lot of times in a wedding, people will hire their photographer before anyone else. They get the venue and then they hire their photographer. And I would always, as a wedding photographer, tell the brides, hire a local wedding florist.
00:10:33
Speaker
Whether I was in the gorge or this applies to any area I truly believe, when you hire a local fender, they know the conditions. For those of you listening who aren't familiar with the Columbia River Gorge, we're known as the windsurfing capital of the world. We have a lot of wind.
00:10:50
Speaker
there's been days where the wind is gusted to 50, 60 miles an hour. And as the wedding photographer, I would watch these tall 24 inch bases get picked up with the wind and shattered pieces on tables. And those were the ones that were from out of area florists that had no clue about the wind conditions. And so that's a really great point about knowing the conditions that you're going into.
Local Floristry and Weather Considerations
00:11:19
Speaker
So I kind of diverged there, but I wanted to throw that plug is if someone's listening, because I know we do have some listeners that are growing flowers for their own weddings or wanting to get into the wedding piece of it. And so knowing I think what conditions are, it's beyond just what flowers are going to look pretty at the wedding, but knowing what needs to be provided so that the flowers are going to look their best and not topple over is
00:11:47
Speaker
is very different than making a CSA bouquet. Yeah. Oh, definitely. And the difference between making a CSA bouquet and wedding flowers, this was something that I really learned. And you, I'm sure have this experience too. For the CSA bouquets,
00:12:06
Speaker
you're trying to give your clients maximum base life. And so you're cutting all your flowers very tight. And so they have the lovely experience of watching them open and having a week or 10 days of flowers. On the wedding side, you want everything completely open at its maximum beauty. And so it's a really different mindset of like, for the wedding flowers,
00:12:33
Speaker
I'm really babysitting those flowers for the whole week before the wedding, getting them like just the right stage of openness. Are they opening too much? Getting back in the cooler, back and forth, back and forth until they're just exactly the right stage. I think that sometimes people don't realize how much goes into that kind of moment of perfection on a particular day. There's a lot to it. It's kind of like Renunculus right now. I was talking with a florist just yesterday, and normally you open them up in a smaller bud, but if
00:13:02
Speaker
you're delivering on a Thursday to a florist and they need it for a Friday wedding, those ranunculus need to be open when you deliver to them. And so if you're the farmer florist, you're not only harvesting them, but you've got to get them to the right stage. What are some of the flowers that require the most babysitting for getting ready for a wedding?
Continued Learning and Workshops
00:13:24
Speaker
No, I think roses, peonies, or peonies are one of those ones where you need that you want them open, but they aren't the most long lasting, so you don't want them to blow too. Yeah. I think tulips can be that way too. They go over fast when it gets hot. Yeah. Especially some of them that blow open so fast, like the exotic emperor, that one blows open so quickly that I imagine it's a challenge.
00:13:49
Speaker
I've realized that I've done a few a la carts, but I really like to just grow them and give the flowers to people like you so you can do the magic and arrange them because there is so much babysitting. Not the client, but the flowers. So you mentioned you've done some training. What kind of training have you done?
00:14:09
Speaker
I've taken courses with good floral designers who are wedding specialists. I actually just came back from an amazing class with Ariella Chazar and Max Gill, who are both nationally or internationally known wedding florists. And it was so inspirational. But I think for anybody, I would say, invest in yourself. Invest in your own education.
00:14:38
Speaker
I think that's such great advice. I love continually learning, especially in the floral industry. Things are changing. There's new trends or new styles or new ways of doing things or things you just don't know. I did an arranging class last year and it was amazing how much I can look back and see how far I've come. Do you notice the
00:15:01
Speaker
When you attend, was this a workshop or an online class? It was an in-person workshop. It was three days. So it was great. We got to do writer bouquets and various arrangements and a giant installation and tablescapes and sort of like learning their thought process and their techniques. It was hugely helpful. And where was that class?
00:15:26
Speaker
Um, it was in the Bay area. It was in, um, Emeryville. Okay. So you flew down to California for that. Oh, fun. And do they use
00:15:35
Speaker
local flowers for this? I'm curious. They do. And actually, the class was amazing in that the San Francisco floral market is off the charts. And both of those two designers are completely committed to local flowers. And some of the other classes that I've taken have been more kind of just typical imported flowers.
00:15:59
Speaker
It's rare that I've been to a class where I'm handling flowers as pretty as the things that you and I grow. There is just something about local flowers that is, there's a life force to them. They're really special. So it was nice to be in a class where they also had, you know, amazing clematis and dogwood and just things that you often don't see. It is neat. There's such a difference in local flowers.
00:16:28
Speaker
and those that are imported. We have, obviously, where we are in the Columbia River Gorge, we're actually a huge wedding destination. One of our wedding venues was the top five wedding venue about
00:16:41
Speaker
15 years ago, probably now. I remember it was right when I was first getting into wedding photography and it's kind of what blew up the gorge for weddings and has helped so many local businesses really grow, even our floral businesses, because with Mount Hood, the river, it's just such a picturesque spot to get married, but we're not year round weddings.
Seasonal Flower Options for Weddings
00:17:00
Speaker
So what is your wedding season? When does it start? When does it end?
00:17:03
Speaker
Um, it's sort of April to October, which is a long, which is a long season. I normally have like one or two April brides. I wish there were more actually because they were gorgeous spring flowers. Um, the problem here, I think it's just that the weather is iffy and everybody wants the outdoor, beautiful views and all of that stuff. But, um, yeah. So if there are any spring brides out there, contact me. I'm, I really want to do more spring weddings. Well, and this last April,
00:17:31
Speaker
The weather was gorgeous. I mean, we had a pretty wet May, which is hit or miss, but April was stunning this year. And we had almost no rain. I don't know if we had any measurable rain in April. So if someone's getting married in the spring in the Pacific Northwest, what are some local flowers that they could
00:17:51
Speaker
Either for someone listening who's a farmer wanting to think about growing next year or someone who's listening that's going to be getting married next spring, what are local flowers that could be incorporated in the spring weddings?
00:18:04
Speaker
Well, there would be tulips and daffodils. There's a lot of flowering branches, so peaches and apple. And there's a very early spirea that's lovely. And then other sort of force bulbs, like Spanish hyacinths I've been really into recently. I think they're really pretty. Muscari, there are a few. Like linaria, there are a few other
00:18:32
Speaker
perennials that are very early. But especially you're then you have to have ranunculus and anemones in the hoop house. But yeah, there's a beautiful assortment and the tulip assortment particularly there's so many as you know, varieties of doubles and parrot tulips just so romantic. They're so beautiful. And I mean, some of them look like peonies. Yeah, almost like I had someone
00:18:57
Speaker
picks them up for a wedding this year. And they said, are you sure these aren't peonies? And I'm like, no, they're tulips. Yeah. Okay. So we have the spring brides and then May and June. I've always found that June is, it's a beautiful month to get married in the gorge, but I always struggle as a flower farmer, being able to offer a bunch of flowers. Cause I feel like I'm kind of in a transition period. What do you do? It can be the real, um,
00:19:20
Speaker
It can be a kind of dead month in a way. And the strategy that I've adopted is growing a lot of perennials. And I had two weddings pick up this week and 10 days ago I was like, Oh my gosh, what am I going to do? I promise these people flowers. I'm not going to have anything. And, um, there was another flower former who has a saying, you know, trust the field. And it's true. If you've got a lot of stuff out there,
00:19:47
Speaker
The field will deliver. It's hard to have confidence, but it will. And so, like right now, I've got maybe five different kind of columbines. They're so pretty. Oh, a lot of columbines. So pretty. Alliums are coming in now. Lots of gorgeous geum. So actually, my peonies have just started. But even without the peonies,
00:20:13
Speaker
Renunculus, anemones, there's a ton of stuff, but it really is relying on the perennials and some early kind of biennial type things to get you through May and June. And how long do you hold your peonies out of curiosity? Because if they start blooming in May, can you still have your peonies in June?
00:20:37
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I probably hold them two or three weeks. I've definitely done them longer. You know, for a wedding, if you've got a really cold cooler, you could probably do a month or six weeks. I haven't quite pushed it as far as that. I also just sort of go through them a little bit faster than that. But every year is a little bit variable because I finished picking the coral charm peonies.
00:21:04
Speaker
And in the last couple of days, they're done. But last year, I had a May 30th wedding that I had promised peonies for, and we didn't have anything. I had to find a Willamette Valley grower, which is a warmer climate than we have, to be able to fulfill that wedding. So every year is a little bit different. We were really late last year. We were so late last year. And then it got so hot.
00:21:29
Speaker
So I remember I was planting dahlias trying to harvest peonies and it was like 95 degrees outside. Yeah. So yeah, every year is really different. And this year we're getting, I think we're kind of lucky because it's in the sixties right now.
Seasonal Transitions and Challenges
00:21:43
Speaker
We're, I'm having to look at my clock here. It is the middle of May cause this will launch right towards the end of May, this episode. Um, so we've talked about spring flowers, May and June. What about kind of,
00:21:58
Speaker
the peak of summer, what flowers do you like to use in weddings for local flowers? Well, it will be a lot of dahlias, yeah. I planted a bunch of garden roses over the last two years, so hopefully this year they'll be coming into production. I do do a lot of lilies, and those are, you're able to succession plant those so you can have them over a couple month period. And then the kind of the normal
00:22:27
Speaker
summer things, cosmos, and zinnias, merry golds. Yeah. And what about fall? So that's, is that your dahlias, do they start in October? I can't talk here. Do your dahlias start in August? Is that? They do. I think people always think of them as like a, you know, like, I don't know, mid summer plant, but they're not really, they're really kind of Indian summer into fall. And a lot of times
00:22:53
Speaker
For me, they're looking their very best around the beginning of October, actually. Yes. Last year, October was when they were really at their peak for me. So it is interesting because I always have to remind myself, I'm so excited to see them in other parts of the country. We'll get their dahlias sooner. Much earlier. Yeah. Unless you leave them in the ground, like in Portland, I know if people leave their dahlias in the ground, which is only an hour from here, but they're so much warmer than us.
00:23:19
Speaker
that they get their dahlias so much sooner. Oh, and then I do 10 of Lizzie and this that's the other thing that gets me through August and September. And those are gorgeous, which are amazing for weddings. They are amazing. Those are they're expensive. Do you grow those from seed or plug plug? Yeah, they just take up too much space. Yeah. And so then fall.
00:23:41
Speaker
You also go into fall until we have a, our frost is always unpredictable. We can have it. I think the earliest I've recorded in my notes was end of September. We've gone into November. So how do you deter? Well, first let's ask, what do you use in the fall for your wedding bouquets? So the dalliers are continuing. I've gotten really into chrysanthemums in the last couple of years and they will bloom over maybe a two month period.
00:24:09
Speaker
And there is something about getting a new flower at the end of September that just, it's exciting. For me, I always, the flower I like best is always the new thing, but I think by the time you're getting to the very end of the season, you've seen everything a lot, you're getting a little jaded, and then to have these new, beautiful things, it just perks me up again. Yes, it's so nice to see them. And you grow some really beautiful varieties. Do you have any favorite mums
00:24:39
Speaker
Um, so yeah, I really like, um, Pat Lehman. There are a bunch of ones that have funny, like football names, like homecoming cheerleader, stadium queen, um, that I think are bred from Minnesota or something. They're supposed to be cold, hardy varieties. Um, but they're really good. I also grow some of the King's mom heirloom ones that are
00:25:06
Speaker
really cool or have like Japanese breeding spider mums. Yeah. Awesome. And do you grow those outdoors or in a hoop house? I grow those in a hoop house. And so the way I manage the hoop is that in the springtime, it's all ridiculous and anemones.
Year-Round Production with a Hoop House
00:25:25
Speaker
And then probably in the next week or two, all of those will come out and we'll have almost entirely mums. I've got some
00:25:33
Speaker
scented geraniums. I'm growing Tweety up for the first time. So those also go in the hoop. Oh nice. Okay. And before I talk about your hoop, I'm curious when you're planning out weddings because the frost date is always unpredictable. Do you just choose like a certain time that you finish weddings for the season as a local grower or how do you determine? I do. I feel pretty comfortable like
00:25:57
Speaker
The first week or so of October, I'm pretty comfortable with that. I don't go much later than that. It's always hard because we can sometimes have such beautiful October's, but I'm really nervous to commit to flowers. But the production goes down as we start to have less light. You don't have as much volume either in later October. That's a great point.
00:26:21
Speaker
and the weddings tend to dwindle also naturally because of the weather. It's less predictable and people want those outdoor Mount Hood views for their weddings here. I do want to ask you about your hoop house, but before I go there, I want to talk about sustainability in the wedding industry as a florist. You don't use any floral foam. No. Yeah. I think there's a,
00:26:49
Speaker
a strong and established movement to be foam free. And you can almost always, so floral foam or like Oasis is a product that's, you know, full of made of sort of petrochemicals and it's
00:27:06
Speaker
nasty to handle, it just goes in the landfill. I also think that arrangements and it can look a little stiff because you're sticking stems into a very precise position. And you know, I do want to position stems, but I think we normally will use chicken wire and provide actual water sources. And I think flowers, they would rather be in water than in foam. And using
00:27:32
Speaker
chicken wire, other armatures, you know, like a pin frog or something. I think the flowers just, they also look more natural. They're a little more, they have a little more movement to them. They're not so stiff. So I think both from an aesthetic and a sustainability viewpoint, they're easier. And then like on the cleanup side, if you're taking down a big arch or something, if you're just pulling things out of chicken wire, everything can go straight into the compost, nothing in the trash.
00:28:01
Speaker
That's a great point too. I didn't think about that, about the flower piece of it, because otherwise you're putting that floral foam into the compost or when it usually just goes straight into the trash and then goes to the landfill or ends up in the ocean and doesn't really break down. So I know it's always discouraging when I go to the Portland flower market and I see so much foam
00:28:25
Speaker
still there and I'm
Sustainability in Floristry
00:28:27
Speaker
not trying to get political or anything here but I commend you that you are foam free and you put such an emphasis on really finding alternative methods and the chicken wire I think is pretty commonly used with farmer florists anyways but it's such a great thing I mean you can reuse it and shape it and I took a course or a workshop two years ago now
00:28:51
Speaker
And it's amazing how much I now find myself using the chicken wire. I've never used the foam before that. But having something to give your flowers a base versus, because before that I actually unfortunately used just the floral tape. Made a little grid. I made a grid, but the chicken wire gives you so much more to work with because especially if you fold it over two or three times, you have several layers in your compote or bowl or whatever you're using.
00:29:20
Speaker
It really provides such great support for your flowers, but also gives that movement that you were talking about. So I think that's great that that is something that you really focus on and prioritize. You have a hoop house that you built how many years ago now?
00:29:35
Speaker
I think four. It was four years ago. Did you get a grant for that? I didn't and I wish I did. That was just being an amateur that was thinking like that it was going to be too much work or too complicated and that's not the truth. I think they're easy to get and lots of our friends have gotten them. So if I build another one, I definitely will get a grant. That's something that is a goal of mine when we find new land is to get a grant for a hoop house because
00:30:05
Speaker
I think it's really great that the government provides that assistance and help for flower farmers and farmers in general. And it's very, it's really transformative to have one. There's so many different ways that you can use it to extend your season.
Tulip Forcing Techniques
00:30:18
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Cause you can start, well you, oh, that's what we should talk about. Did you force your tulips in the hoop house?
00:30:25
Speaker
I did some in the hoop house. So my big discovery in the last year is how much you can manipulate your tulip harvest to have them over a really long period. Probably you could probably have tulips over a six month period if you wanted to. So I grew some indoors hydroponically and that gave me tulips in
00:30:52
Speaker
January and February and then I had planted a bunch of tulips and crates and they spent their winters outside and Tulips are really easy to force. So if you bring them into a warm lighted area Once they've had most of their winter cooling They will bloom two weeks to the day from the time you bring them into a warm area. So I have a little a
00:31:18
Speaker
heated space, so I would bring crates in. So in March and April, I had those. And then sort of April and into May had tulips in the hoop house or out in the field. And you can also manipulate
00:31:34
Speaker
tulips to bloom a little later by putting them in shady areas. So like the last week or 10 days of tulips were things that I intentionally put in areas that just didn't get as much sun. And that's actually an awesome trick because you also like with a lot of things, if you provide a little bit of shade, you'll get taller stems.
00:31:56
Speaker
So that's kind of cool to know. I grew all of mine in the shade this year because I was worried with them in the crates and not having a great water source. I didn't want them drying out super fast. And my stems were so long on some of the varieties like Menten and Gouda Shink were three plus feet long. It was crazy. Yeah, it's really amazing. Now you grow your tulips and crates. And how many did you grow?
00:32:26
Speaker
I grew about 8,000 last year or this spring, but I think I'm going to grow more like 10 next year because I had the same problem that I've had every year, which is I ran out of things for Mother's Day because where we are really tulips are the best option for Mother's Day flowers, for a focal flower. And I had sold out of things maybe like a week before Mother's Day, so I need to plan
00:32:57
Speaker
That's a lot of tulips. You harvest them by yourself or you have farm help at that time. I have farm help, yeah. But still, I mean, I did 4,000 this year and it was just me processing them. Tulips are a very nerve-wracking plant because they go so fast. You have to pick them when they're just showing color.
00:33:17
Speaker
if you ignore them and try and come back in the afternoon, then they've opened up and you can just throw them away because you've missed your opportunity. I always think that like getting them in the cooler is like putting them in the bank, you know, but the whole time of the couple months of tulip harvest, yeah, it's a little intense, especially if you have a warm day. Yes. Well, we had a couple of warm days. I feel like they almost broke me this year because I was trying to also get my seeds going and everything has
00:33:46
Speaker
I started so many seeds late because it was non-stop tulips coming on for, I mean, it felt like it was over literally everything bloomed in a two week period for me because I didn't have space to control when they go the trickling out. Yeah. And so it was all at once. And then the cooler was overflowing. I have two coolers. So I've got a small cooler where I was putting all the tulips and then my
00:34:09
Speaker
main walk-in cooler is full of Dahlia tubers, but that's at 45 degrees. So I couldn't put the tulips in there. How do you store your tulips? I mostly take the bulb off and I'll store them flat in crates. Do you wrap them up or just put them in the crate? I do. So I put them in like brown paper and I'll do like, you know, I will bundle them in 10 stem bunches just to make it easy for me to count and each
00:34:34
Speaker
So I'll use the bulb crates that we buy the bulbs in for storage and then I'll stack them up and they're all labeled. And yeah, and then if your cooler is nice and cold, so I kind of keep mine 35 or so for tulips. That's what I do too. They last beautifully. They last awesome. How long do you store yours for? What's the longest you've pushed it? Probably a month.
00:35:00
Speaker
Yeah. And that would be like if I was going to do, so I actually have a little graduation party event this weekend that I use some tulips that are pretty old, but I just hydrated them today and they look awesome. Oh, great. So they only need to look good for a day. They only need to look good for a day. Yeah, I wouldn't probably, if I kept it a month, I wouldn't want to sell it to a bouquet subscription client who's expecting to get a week out of it. But for an event, it would be just fine.
00:35:30
Speaker
So tell me about your subscriptions with your CSA. How many CSA subscriptions do you do a year? So I'd like to do 50. So I'll deliver two different days with 25 on each day is kind of the plan.
CSA Bouquet Subscription Model
00:35:47
Speaker
And do you do just one subscription for the whole season or do you break it up? I break it up. I do a spring one that's four weeks. So that's kind of the two of the subscription.
00:35:56
Speaker
when people are really hungry for flowers and then i do a main season one which just started this week which is um with the second week of may and there's often a little gap between the spring one ending and the sort of summer one going and the main season one is 20 weeks and oh wow yeah so i would say most people
00:36:17
Speaker
Three quarters of my people buy the whole season, and then I also sell it in four-week chunks. So I have a certain number of people who pop on for four weeks and pop off. Yeah. That is a lot. So you have 24 weeks of CSA subscriptions throughout the year. Yeah, it is a lot. And part of...
00:36:38
Speaker
our thing is that every week should be different. Like I don't really like to repeat flowers very much, or if I'm gonna repeat something, it'll be a different one. So they will get sunflowers more than one time, but they'll be, maybe they'll get white light, that sort of pale yellow variety. And then the next time, you know, a month or six weeks later, they might get a more traditional, you know, orange one with a brown center.
00:37:05
Speaker
And I like it for the mood to be really different. So they might get pale pastels one week, and then they might get bright colors the next week. Because I'm trying to sort of show them
00:37:20
Speaker
the season through flowers. And I think that the people who buy the whole shebang really get to like feel what it's like to be kind of at the farm and see the different flowers. They change all the time, you know, that the May flowers are so different than October ones, but I think they connect
00:37:43
Speaker
the person to the season and the land in a way that I think customers really appreciate. They really appreciate just kind of getting to be in touch with the season through flowers. That's really neat. And that's a lot of work. So 50 bouquets a week for 24 weeks, twice a week. Are you the one that's making these bouquets or who makes the bouquets? There's always almost always somebody with me. Yeah. And how do you see my daughter?
00:38:12
Speaker
And is she still involved with the farm? I don't think she's going to be this summer. She's graduating college. So I think she's going to get a real job. Yeah. But I do have some wonderful employees. Yeah. And we do a recipe, right? So the first year that I did a CSA, I did that every bouquet is different. And everyone took me like 25 minutes to make.
00:38:39
Speaker
was losing my mind. But now it's definitely, you know, it's four of this and three of that. And we line them up and you walk down the line and you build the bouquet so we can be fast. How long does it take you to make a bouquet? For the CSA? For one? Oh, I don't know, maybe a minute or two. It's not super long. So you're really efficient. We're pretty fast. Yeah. And what goes into your ingredients on your CSA bouquets?
Passion for Diverse Plant Growing
00:39:07
Speaker
do you kind of follow a recipe of like a focal flower and then? I generally will have like a focal and then some amount of foliage and you know the things that I really like are I've come like the jewelry the little little whimsical fun things and so
00:39:23
Speaker
like the week that we just had were into the last of our tulips and then I had um snowball viburnum as my kind of foliage and I also had some euphorbia but the things that like to me really made the bouquet were we had
00:39:39
Speaker
lovely orange geum, which is super cute and had a columbine. And then there's a plant called linaria. It looks like a kind of a baby snapdragon. Yes. Yeah. So, you know, the kind of little extra things are to me the things that connect to the season in a way. And also that aren't traditional florist plants that just feel to me like more special. I feel like for bouquet subscribers, they get like just a lot of like really interesting things.
00:40:10
Speaker
So you must grow a lot of different types of plants. I do, I do. It's it. And, um, people always advise not to do that, that you should, you know, do less. And I think that from a business and a sanity sense, that is awesome advice. It is exactly the advice I would give too. But, um, I am just, I like plants. I like new plants and I like a lot of variety. I've got a short attention span.
00:40:39
Speaker
And so I want to be excited all the time with something new and different. And I'm 56 years old, and I'm running my own business. And I can run it however I want. And I don't think it's the most profitable or sensible way to do it, to grow a lot of different things. But it's the thing that kind of lights my fire. So I'm doing it this way. Well, I know. I think it was Marin from the Farmhouse Flower Farm. She was the first one on the podcast that said, grow what brings you joy.
00:41:08
Speaker
And it sounds like that's exactly what you're doing is you're choosing the flowers that you find joy in to grow. And then you're sharing that joy with your CSA and your wedding clients and everyone that purchases from your farm. And for your business model, it works. For me, I'm focusing on really trying to hybridize dahlias. So I'm niching down on growing less so I can be really good at it. But you're offering these beautiful CSA bouquet subscriptions and these full service weddings
00:41:38
Speaker
where if you only had dahlias, you wouldn't be able to offer the full service weddings. So I think there's, what I love about getting to talk to different guests is there's so many different business models. It's not like you say, I'm going to be a flower farmer and you have to do this. It's like, I'm going to be a flower farmer. And then I get to choose like what brings me joy. And part of it's that experimentation you mentioned in your first year,
00:42:04
Speaker
you grew a whole bunch, but just a lot of little things. Is that when you, you didn't sell anything your first year, did you? I did, but I need to selling $10 bouquets to friends. It was not much. You didn't have huge commitments. No, exactly. I wanted to make it. Yeah. That year I decided to make it cheap enough that if
00:42:25
Speaker
I had a total fail one week. Nobody would feel that bad about it. Yeah. And I love it. It started with friends. So friends are probably more encouraging and supportive and they're cheering you on and excited to see what you're growing versus a business that is relying on a delivery or a florist.
00:42:41
Speaker
I know a lot of people will go to a florist their first year and they're like, look what I'm growing. But if you don't know how it's going to perform, you don't know how long you're going to have it. And how much quantity you're going to have and all of that stuff. Yeah, that would be hard. Especially once you're learning what's a cut and come again versus a single use cut. If you go through everything in one week or you have a crop failure, you can't guarantee certain things. So I think that's also a nice thing for you is if you have a crop failure in one thing,
00:43:10
Speaker
I've got lots of backups, yeah. And I will say a big part of the backbone of the business is perennials. And they're the thing that are the least amount of work. So we talked about Columbines coming in right now. I do nothing to the Columbines. I grew them from seed. They take a couple of years to flower, but I maybe weed their beds at the beginning of the season.
00:43:38
Speaker
Then I harvest them and then apart from keeping them watered. I don't do anything else to them They're like very in the same with like the GM and a still be is another one you know, they just come back and come back and the only thing I do is harvest them and so that's compared to an annual where you're planting the seed and you know taking care of it as a baby and all of the different steps so I
00:44:04
Speaker
I think you're really wise to invest in the perennials, because for your scale, if you only did annuals. You'd go crazy. Yes, you would go crazy. Because I've leased land, it's been harder for me to invest in a lot of perennials. And we're still in the search for those that have been asking. We haven't found our permanent new farm yet. And once we do, that will be one of the first things I invest in, is adding perennials. Even though I'm trying to niche down on the dahlias,
00:44:34
Speaker
love things like the hydrangeas and nine bark and those kinds of things you can never have enough of that are the backbone. I remember a few years ago, did you go to Armitage in Eugene? I remember so for those that are in the Pacific Northwest, Armitage in Eugene has a great selection of perennials and Heather shared with me and I can't wait for the day that I can go and buy a whole bunch of them. You invested in perennials how long ago?
Perennials and Low-Maintenance Strategies
00:45:02
Speaker
Would you say? It was almost from the beginning, at least some. And I think those hydrangeas that you brought up are so great.
00:45:10
Speaker
they've got such a long season of harvest because you can pick them when, like the ones we mostly do are panicky a lot of varieties. Um, but they're, you know, when they're white and creamy all the way to when they're, um, sort of rosy later in the season and then even when they're dried, but you know, you've got several months of being able to use them. And they're another one that you don't do anything to except
00:45:36
Speaker
you know, harvest them. Yeah. And then do you heavily prune them in the winter or are they kind of already pruned because you've been harvesting? No, I do do a little prune in the, yeah. Okay. Yeah. So what are your main perennials that you have on your property?
00:45:49
Speaker
Um, so I do have a bunch of woodies and like, so right now the woody that is most exciting is bridal. They're Valspiria and there's like three different varieties and every one of them is lovely. And, um, like I was just making a bridal bouquet with, with using them. And it's like, it's such a cheater flower because they drape beautifully. They're just this little white froth. Um, yeah.
00:46:13
Speaker
Our audience can't see, but there's one right in front of us. Yes, it's super pretty. I love them. That's a great one. I would have a whole bunch of those if I had more space. You also dry flowers, right? I do, although I'm pulling back from that. Sometimes you also have to realize what you hate and
00:46:38
Speaker
I like the look of dried flowers. I hate handling them. They are such a mess. Like when you're putting together bouquets, you're breaking things and it's dusty and the floor is covered with stuff. And I find it hard to charge as much as you should because
00:46:58
Speaker
They also shrink when they're dried. And they should be twice as expensive as fresh flowers because you've added a whole extra step of drying them, storing them, all of that stuff. So it is nice to have something to sell in the winter time, but I definitely have a love-hate relationship with them. Yes. Well, and you have such a long season. Do you ever have any downtime?
00:47:23
Speaker
I do have downtime in the winter. I do. Although I do like to force some bulbs, you know, in the winter. We'll do paperwhites and amaryllis, but I do a lot of narcissists and mascara and things like that in the early spring, January, February, when I think having a little green thing in the house is very uplifting. And you sell those at the farmer's market, right? I do. That's really neat.
00:47:48
Speaker
And you're on 18 acres. Hopefully in the show notes, we can include a few pictures of your property. Heather lives on an absolutely dream property. She lives. My husband always says that that road is his dream road to live on. She lives on the Hood River. So in Hood River, we have the Columbia River, which is the main river. And then we have the Hood River, which runs down from Mount Hood and flows into the Columbia.
00:48:15
Speaker
So you have this space kind of carved out on your property and want to paint a picture for our audience where you have this beautiful one acre section where you have all of your annuals and perennials for your cut flower business. But you are surrounded by woods and you're almost, you're pretty close to the national forest where you are. Do you ever do any foraging on your property? I do, especially in the springtime when I'm looking for
00:48:43
Speaker
Greenery to go with tulips. So I do a ton of Snowberry is an awesome greenery. It's got really arching branches and the leaves are pretty durable In the next week or so, we've got wild mock orange Philadelphia's I always get get some of that I love actually big leaf maple the sort of flower heads of big leaf maple or sort of pendulant and cool looking that's another kind of early spring thing and
00:49:13
Speaker
Yeah. Do you have any tips for anyone that's wanting to forage flowers? Um, I think you just need, you know, if it's your own property, um, just go, go light.
Sustainable Foraging Tips
00:49:26
Speaker
Like, um, don't cut something, you know, if it's a bush, I will always say, you know, never cut more than about a quarter of it so that you want it to continue to thrive. Yeah. And I don't,
00:49:40
Speaker
you obviously have your own access, but if someone doesn't have access, there's rules that they need to follow for just going out and foraging in the forest, right? They have to have a permit. Is that? I think in the national forest, I think you can get a permit to do some foraging. Yeah. And I don't think it's expensive, five bucks or something, but you do need to follow the rules. Yeah. Yes. Okay. Thank you for clarifying that. I don't want to encourage people to do something that's not supposed to be done. Um,
00:50:06
Speaker
Because of where you live, you also have lots of animals coming through your yard. Is that correct? Do you have deer? I do, I do. And I've been really knock wood. I've been lucky on the deer, but I think my luck might be running out because I did plant these roses. And even though they've got, like you said, we're surrounded by wood that has wild roses in it.
00:50:32
Speaker
But they seem to think that the plant roses that I planted are tastier then. And so I don't have a deer. I haven't had a deer fence. I know a lot of farmers around here do. And I think that I'm going to have to break down and do it. It's really expensive. Well, because of where you are, I know we looked at a property.
00:50:50
Speaker
a couple houses down from you and they had an elk fence that even had spots that was torn down and it was 10 or 12 feet tall. I was doing some reading yesterday for someone in the Dalia patch, the online community that I run. They were asking me, they were confused between bone meal and blood meal. And as I was looking at blood meal, and I need to do a little bit more research, so I might be premature sharing this on here.
00:51:14
Speaker
But I did read online that it is a deer and rodent deterrent. And so maybe you can experiment for us. And that's a good idea. See if the, if you can use blood meal, not bone meal, but blood meal as a fertilizer to help deter the deer because online, I mean, I only spent about 10 minutes reading up on it, but it was saying that one of the benefits of blood meal
00:51:38
Speaker
was that it deters the deer. Do you put it in the ground or do you try and make a foley or? It was in the ground. So instead of bone meal or like alfalfa or other kinds of fertilizers when you're planting, you feed with the blood meal instead. And I know things like tomatoes do really well with the blood meal. So I thought that was fascinating because as we're beginning our search for permanent land, almost everything in the Hood River area
00:52:05
Speaker
is around deer pressure. So I've been thinking, how am I going to keep deer away from? Do the deer eat the dahlias? I haven't noticed that. They have a few things that they like, at least in my place. The dahlias haven't been one of them. They like raspberries, which is kind of annoying because they grow raspberries for foliage. Love raspberry foliage. Yeah, they like that.
00:52:33
Speaker
And yeah, and they seem to love eating the tips off roses, especially like rose buds. They just think of the most delicious thing ever. So that's irritating. They do smell really good. But yeah, I wonder if the blood mill would work on that. Yeah. Um, let's see here. I know where time is getting close. I want to ask you some advice questions for those that are listening that are interested in adding or if maybe they're already a farmer,
00:53:02
Speaker
they're not a farmer florist, what advice would you have for someone that's wanting to get into the more floristry side of the business? To give yourself some time to do some creative practice. I know that it's with the actual farming, it's hard to keep up with just the planting and harvesting and stuff, but to really
00:53:25
Speaker
a couple of times a week, cut some flowers, take an hour and make an arrangement and make lots of different kinds of things. So like decide you're going to spend, you know, an hour making three kinds of boutonnieres or yeah, just like the more that you can handle things, the better.
00:53:46
Speaker
I think that one of the wonderful things about growing the flowers that you're going to use in arrangements is it really inspires your floral arrangements. And part of it's just like kind of that thing from the food world.
00:54:03
Speaker
grows together, goes together. And I've seen lots of flower associations that I might just have two buckets of flowers next to each other in the cooler. And I never thought about putting them together. And I see them next to each other. And it's like, those colors are beautiful together. And that might inspire an arrangement to sort of mess around with. I really love color. And so to try lots of different color schemes.
00:54:29
Speaker
Um, so yeah, so good, but I think it's very easy to not, um, nurture your creative self. I love that. That's a goal of mine this summer. Not just, I want not for the weddings, but just in general, give myself that permission or time to be creative because it's amazing what you can come up with when you're not under stress and not under pressure and not having to deliver something and you just can play. Um, last summer, Olivia and I did a,
00:54:58
Speaker
My daughter and I did a video for an educational content that hopefully is coming out this summer. It's just a quick little piece for Bloom TV and PBS. And it was so fun because they asked
00:55:09
Speaker
her, and she's nine, what do you love most about when you have flowers? And she said, I like that I get to be creative. And no one tells me what I have to do. Oh, that's so nice. And it stood out to me of the like, here's this nine year old with these wise words, realizing that when you when no one's putting any pressure on you, you have this full freedom to be creative. And so I think that's really beautiful advice he gave us.
00:55:37
Speaker
I know what I was going to ask you earlier that I had forgotten to ask you, you don't use any pesticides on your farm.
Natural Pest Management
00:55:44
Speaker
How do you sustainably farm without using pesticides? Um, we live in a really, really good environment. And honestly, I, it might be very different if we lived on the East coast with humidity and Japanese beetles and stuff. But, um, I think you probably find this too. We, we have,
00:56:07
Speaker
Because we grow so many different plants, it's not like a mono crop and we're surrounded by forest. I think that you've got lots of beneficial insects and birds and things that just take care of things. I think if the plants are really healthy, they're pretty strong. I will occasionally have issues
00:56:28
Speaker
with, you know, everybody has thrips sometimes. And I do put organza bags on white dahlias, especially like at the beginning of this season when they seem to be, everybody likes a white flower. But honestly, this is another knock wood. I just, I haven't had that many issues. Do you bring in beneficials? I don't. I just kind of let, I just kind of let, you know, nature take its course.
00:56:57
Speaker
That's amazing. I probably in the next half hour should have a delivery from FedEx of beneficials. I have my new pirate bugs coming today to help me with our thrips because I have terrible thrips this year on our peonies. And I was telling Heather before we started recording that my pastel elegance, which are so expensive and they're in their
00:57:24
Speaker
I forget if it's third or fourth year this year. So I was expecting some really great blooms. Every single bloom is ruined from them piercing before they even got to marshmallow stage. So I'm going to make sure I get the thrips under control. And because I'm in a neighborhood setting, I probably don't have the same beneficials that you do. That was, I didn't think about having the national forest right there probably does bring in a lot of beneficials.
00:57:49
Speaker
And you have so many flowers that they are attracted to, that I'm sure helps that too. Yeah, I would think so. And then by not spraying, you're not killing the beneficials either. Do you do any foliar sprays or anything like that?
00:58:03
Speaker
I do and the big one from last year was a great tip from you, which is a calcium spray as a foliar spray on dahlias.
Strengthening Plants with Calcium Sprays
00:58:16
Speaker
I had had some real floppy stem dahlias and I came to your house and yours were like steel rods. I was like, Jen, what are you doing? And we'll post your little concoction because I did kind of the same mix of things. Well, I have a foliar spray and I always caution people that like your soil test will tell you what you need.
00:58:33
Speaker
So I use high bricks molasses and I just use based on the back of the Bottle how much it says to use but I have to give all credit to Jenny love on From from love and fresh flowers and the no-till flowers podcast because that was where I first heard about high bricks molasses so I started using high bricks molasses with my worm casings and my compost tea solutions that I use and then I I decided
00:59:03
Speaker
that I'd been doing some reading about what makes thick stems. And I was reading that lack of calcium can cause your stems to be weak. And as we were saying earlier, it's so windy here. And my field that I had last summer literally sits in this wind tunnel and it was probably 35 to 40 mile hour wind gusts on a regular basis. And I couldn't afford to have them get broken and snapped like they had in the past. So I decided,
00:59:31
Speaker
I'm going to just up the calcium intake. And so I got a liquid cal organic calcium and I followed the dosage instructions and I have a 10 gallon home brewing kit and I added the calcium to it and I did it. I tried to do it weekly, but it ended up being a bi-monthly foliar spray.
00:59:51
Speaker
And you're right, my stems were so strong. It was almost a little hard in my dilute braiding patch to evaluate because when I shake the stems, they were all strong. It didn't fix the bobble heads. It doesn't fix the bobble head, but it definitely makes the stems stronger. So I'm glad to know that it's working for you.
01:00:09
Speaker
not quite instantaneous, but almost like if you spray one day, the next day, the stems will be hard. It's really fast. There's such high water content that they absorb that fully as long as, I mean, you don't want to spray it in the middle of the day. So either early morning or late at night before the sun sets, getting that on them so they can absorb that and really soak it into the stems truly makes a difference for the dahlias.
01:00:35
Speaker
And I've been using the same mix of hybrids, compost tea and calcium on ranunculus and anemones this year. And they also seem to, they're ones where, you know, stems can sometimes split and you can have other sort of weak stems and it's helped them a ton too. Yes. That's actually, thank you for saying that. That's how I first started using it for the dahlias was I was having problems with my ranunculus
01:00:58
Speaker
having floppy stems, they would look great. You'd harvest them and then they flop over. As soon as you put them in a vase and you're thinking, this doesn't work to sell them. And so I was reading that it was a calcium issue. So I sprayed them with the calcium, did wonders on them. And so I thought, I'm going to try it with the dahlias. Yeah. And it worked. So yeah, I'm so glad that's helping you. We have just covered a lot and I know that we could talk so much more. So,
01:01:25
Speaker
I would love to have you back on the podcast. Maybe at the end of the season, you can give us a rundown on how the year went with all of your wedding flowers. I'm sure that so many of our guests are wanting to learn more about you now too. How can people find you? On the web, it's just heathersflowerfarm.com. Instagram is the same.
01:01:47
Speaker
Heather's Flower Farm. Perfect. And we'll include links in today's show notes. And before we conclude today, is there any final advice that you would like to give to those that are tuning in and listening today? Um, it's not really advice, but, um, I wanted to say sort of what I think the difference is between local flowers and imported flowers.
Storytelling with Local Flowers
01:02:13
Speaker
And I think
01:02:15
Speaker
what it is, is for me, they tell a story. And so like my bouquet subscribers, I like to say that there's like a narrative to the flowers. And so when they first get them, they're in tight bud and then they open up and they change and the stems move. And
01:02:40
Speaker
They die, but a lot of things will die kind of a pretty death, you know, the way tulips kind of twist and turn and ranunculus too. But so over the course of a week, a lot of different things will happen in the vase. And every time someone comes down to breakfast and sees the flowers on their table, they look different and interesting. And when you get imported flowers or supermarket flowers, they're never going to look better than the day that you buy them.
01:03:06
Speaker
Yeah, and they just die in a sad way. They don't like get better. They just fade. And so if you have an opportunity to support a local farm or grow your own things, like being part of that life narrative is I think the thing that's inspiring about local stuff and locally grown. There's something truly magical and special. And that's so true. Watching that life cycle is a really beautiful
01:03:34
Speaker
process, you get to watch the cycle of life unfold as they're sitting on your table. Yeah. And I would also say that, you know, people always ask about base life, how long things are going to last. And I think that's kind of like the wrong question. I mean, obviously, it's nice if things last longer. But
01:03:53
Speaker
the fact that flowers die and that they're ephemeral is a feature, not a bug. The thing that's special about them is that they are fleeting and that you enjoy that beauty for that fleeting moment. Otherwise, just get silk flowers. Silk flowers, they're lovely ones, but they never have the emotional impact of something that only lasts for a short amount of time.
01:04:19
Speaker
Wow, that's really beautiful. Heather, thank you so much for joining us today. It's been such a delight to chat with you. And we would love to have you back again on the show. Oh, thank you. It's my favorite thing to talk about flowers with you. I occupy all your time because I just want to chat with you. I know I could talk to you for hours. So thank you so much, Heather. And until next time, happy gardening, everyone.
01:04:41
Speaker
Thank you Flower Friends for joining us on another episode of the Backyard Bouquet. I hope you've enjoyed the inspiring stories and valuable gardening insights we've shared today. Whether you're cultivating your own backyard blooms or supporting your local flower farmer, you're contributing to the local flower movement, and we're so happy to have you growing with us. If you'd like to stay connected and continue this blossoming journey with local flowers,
01:05:07
Speaker
Don't forget to subscribe to the Backyard Bouquet podcast. I'd be so grateful if you would take a moment to leave us a review of this episode. And finally, please share this episode with your garden friends. Until next time, keep growing, keep blooming, and remember that every bouquet starts right here in the backyard.