Flower Farming

As couples discover that a wedding with all the traditional frills can run into the tens of thousands of dollars, many are looking for DIY wedding ideas. Brides, grooms, and their families are taking on tasks that previously were hired out, everything from designing the wedding invitations to baking the wedding cake. For experienced gardeners, […]

Mother’s Day is the second Sunday in May, and it is challenging to have a great selection of flowers for this all-important floral holiday. Over the years, we have done a pretty good job of hitting Mother’s Day with big bouquets in which sunflowers are a focal flower. Sunflowers can be grown in 4-inch pots

As the coordinator of the flower track for the Great Plains Growers Conference, I wanted to present something new and unusual for the many experienced flower growers who attend. I was thrilled when Erin Benzakein, GFM’s flower columnist this past year, agreed to be our main speaker. Erin is a certified organic flower grower in

Erin Benzakein writes in the October issue of Growing for Market about her favorite bulb flowers for spring bouquets. Here is her complete list of species and varieties.Allium atropurpureum: very dark purple, almost black. 2.5’ tall, wiry stems. Unique color! Allium bulgaricum siculum: Pinkish purple bells atop 3-4’ stems. Extremely long-lasting blooms (2 weeks in

The conservatory at Longwood Gardens overflowed with the best new lily varieties in the first-ever Lilytopia, an event modeled on the Netherlands’ Keukenhof lily display. Dutch growers shipped 16,000 stems of lilies to the gardens, and teams worked under the direction of Dorien van den Berg, one of Holland’s most inspired floral designers, to arrange

The hybrid delphinium  ‘Guardian Blue’ has these amazing two-toned petals, shown in both photos above. It is absolutely arresting.     Delphinium ‘Aurora Blue’, at above, is a clear mid blue with a white bee. Below, a closeup of two cultivars – ‘Magic Fountain Purple’ with the dark bee and ‘Aurora Blue’ with the white

The zinnias have powdery mildew. The crested celosias are full of insects. The ‘Blue Bedder’ salvia are washed out. The cosmos have just quit for the year. It’s enough to make you hang up your clippers. But then the last flower of the year, the perennial sunflower ‘First Light’ comes into full bloom and you

Here’s a seasonal tip from the archives of Growing for Market. (I am just now trying this myself, so I can’t vouch for its success. If you want to experiment, read the directions carefully and try it on only a few bulbs.) The paperwhite narcissus is a popular bulb for winter forcing, but often the

It’s a well-known fact that peonies attract ants, which crawl around on the flowers, feasting on the sticky sugars they secrete. Once the flower opens fully, and the sucrose has been consumed, the ants depart, whether they are outside or on someone’s dining room table. Those who have had ants leave their centerpiece and march