Our Green Winter Oasis

The ground may be frozen and covered with snow, but inside our propagation house, it’s filled with lush, verdant plants. It’s our oasis while we wait for the spring to really start going. Can you imagine the warm, moisture rich, plant smell as you walk into this place? It’s the stuff dreams are made of!

What do we have growing right now, you ask? So much! Admittedly, we kept some of our dahlias from going into hibernation. We grabbed 10 tubers (or more) from each variety we wanted to build more stock from, potted them up and started the process as of November 1st. We’ve been taking cuttings all winter! Shown below is just a few of the cuttings that we have in the prop house. We have so many now, we had to send some to an overflow space. Just awesome!

If you’re curious about what I’m talking about, or how to do this, check out our YouTube video for more information: Taking Dahlia Cuttings

We also have tons of seeds started, but mostly seeds that can take a bit of cold. Flowers like snapdragons, statice, strawflower, and agrostemma are great for this. They don’t mind getting a little chilled, as long as there’s not direct frost hitting them. They’re perfect for early season, because we can stash them in our unheated greenhouses.

Some of the new seeds we’re trying this year are these hollyhocks. I’m in love with their pretty little frills and the colors are gorgeous. We’re planning on adding these by the Flower Cottage to add a cottage garden effect. I can’t wait to see how they turn out.

Another new variety of flower we’re growing this year is sapponaria. This dainty annual will add a little extra sparkle to bouquets we sell this year. I just love the airiness and pretty color it’ll add. From all indications, it’s going to be a smashing success, but you’ll have to tell us what you think!

Our friends, the Hong-Elder Boys, prompted us to try out love grass this year. We sowed the seeds and it’s starting to come up! It seems to be pretty slow growing at the moment, but I’m hoping to give it plenty of time to grow before putting in the ground.

Below is a picture of the seed starts in the prop house. We observed that seeds germinate a little more sporadically, because the temperature in there isn’t regulated as easily and can generally has a pretty wild fluctuation of temperature…anywhere between 65-85 degrees. The seedlings prefer to be around 70 degrees or so for best germination. However, I just visited the prop house again tonight and saw many, many new little seedlings popping up. I have to keep reminding myself to practice patience, which really isn’t be strong suit.

We’ve been starting seeds day and night and it’ll be this way until the end of June. It’s officially growing season time for our flower farm! I can hardly wait to have flowers again to bring into the house, share with friends, and to work with for floral design. Although it’s only been a few short months, it feels like forever ago that we had flowers.

Happy growing, our friends and feel free to let us know what special things you might be growing this year. We’ve already found so much inspiration in what people have shared with us already! Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts and for following along with us.

Jenn XX

Incredible Allium

Allium often gets overlooked and doesn’t get the recognition or praise that it should in the garden. It’s a flower that people typically plant into their gardens and tend to forget, because it’s so low maintenance. Allium is one of those wonderful bulbs that you can plant into the ground and just walk away from. Can anything be better?!

Their perfectly formed little balls on top of their stem give them a whimsical and lollipop look. Shown below, the contrast of the purple of the allium with ninebark is unusual and stunning. The perfect contrast for true garden design.

Here at PepperHarrow, we use allium for all kinds of things. In the spring, we use them in bouquets for market, weddings, and sell them as single stem flowers (artists love them!). Towards late spring, they dry on the stem and transition into lovely ‘fairy wands’ as Adam calls them. Once dried, they can be hung upside down and stored for fall/winter use in wreaths, or also spray painted in all sorts of gorgeous colors to make an interesting dried bouquet of colorful flowers.

Special Flower Additions for 2019

Adam and I just got back from a needed trip away from the farm and met up with our dearest flower friends.. It was an incredible weekend of full of collaboration, best practice sharing, and lots of time was spent geeking out with other flower lovers over new plant varieties we’re growing this year. It’s funny to me that others obsess over flowers like I do, but I guess it’s not all that surprising. #plantaddictsunite

As a part of our meet-up, we held an Instagram live feed with ‘ask the flower farmer anything’. It was great to hear some of the thoughtful questions fellow plant enthusiasts have out there and I was thrilled to have an opportunity to respond to them. One of the questions that stuck with me in particular was a question about the new/special flowers that are being added to the flower farm this year. I told you that I ‘geek out’ and get excited about flowers, so I wanted to take an opportunity to address this in more detail and share some of the new things we’re trying this year.

Lavender

I’m not sure I need to write anything more about this flower. It’s just one of the loveliest, most fragrant flowers ever! The smell of these lovely plants is enough for me, but the added bonus of their gorgeous blooms just sends me over the edge. Can you imagine what a mass-planting of thousands of lavender plants is going to look like at maturity?

Pansies

These are not your momma’s pansies! We’re growing a variety specifically for cut flower cultivation, so the stems are long enough to go into a bouquet. These adorable blooms are going to grace early spring bouquets we will be selling on the farm and at farmer’s market. If all goes well, we’ll add them to the line-up and will continue to provide them in spring bouquets. Why spring only? Pansies are a cool weather loving flower, so as soon as the heat sets in, they fizzle out a bit.

Smilax

Such a crazy name for a pretty simple vine. This is one of the vines that florists use for weddings. It hold up pretty well out of water and looks absolutely gorgeous. I’ll admit, I’m a little intimidated by this one (starting from seed), because many other flower farmers told me the seedlings are pretty moody. Say a little prayer for me, that I can keep them alive. I’d love to have this available to share locally with other event florists and designers.

Bush Clematis

Where do I start with clematis? Oh.my.gosh. It’s so delicate and beautiful and floral design work. There are little things that differentiate a design and this is one of them. I sourced plugs in on this one instead of starting from seed, because they take a lot of time to grow. I’ll be trellising them, allowing them some support for their 5’ max height. They grow as a bush, so the plant will also have itself for a bit of support as it grows. Be on the lookout for pictures of this one, because I’m pretty sure it’ll be one of the first things I cut!

Pimpinella

Okay, so maybe not the best name ever, but trust me, GOOGLE it! Admittedly, I just had to go grab the seed packet, because I couldn’t remember its other name. It’s also know as: Greater Burnet Saxifrage. This looks like it’s related to one of my favorite filler flowers, Ammi. I’m growing ‘Rosea’, which I soured from Select Seeds and I can’t wait to use them to add a little airiness to my bouquets. It’s going to add that perfect touch of that wildflower look everyone is craving.

Every year we add a few things that are different and interesting. It’s fun to experiment to see what does well, or what doesn’t. We always grow more of the things that thrive and are easy to grow on our flower farm. For those things that don’t, we don’t ever keep them in the line up for the following year. As they say, variety is the spice of life, right?!

What are you growing this year that you’re excited about? Anything different and exciting, or maybe just something new to you that you haven’t grown before? Leave your comments below. We love flowers and can’t wait to hear from you!

-Jenn