Moving mums with Koa and Dean

Weather: Rainy and cold!
So this morning was changeover day, geez it comes around quick! This time Im rotating back through production, and first off Im back with Koa in the mum field. I have hand written entries of my last rotation with Koa which I must write up! Koa runs the mum (Chrysanthemum) fields in the nursery on the other side of highway 1. While Yoko is creating the 1000 bloom Koa is in charge of producing the other forms. This year the include spirals, basket spheres (both large and small), columns, cascades, cloud forms, topiary forms (butterflies)... Its interesting to rotate through again after two months and gives a lot more perspective on the process. Last time I rotated through we (with a team of seasonals who have now left) were doing a lot of training and tying stems down. Since then they have been grown on and trained more, then sheared or pinched. That's a very simplified explanation of a process as all the forms and cultivars are different. Some stretch better, some have to be sprayed with growth regulator, some bud earlier etc... So now everything is budding up and we are moving pretty much everything over to the main nursery complex, where they will then get moved into the conservatory for the mum festival starting later this month.

This month will also see the first frost sometime around the 15th. One thing that I'm not used to is the winterising of the water systems, irrigation etc. Here the water in the pipes freezes and cracks, and for that reason a lot of irrigation systems (eg the mum fields) are closed down and the systems blown out.

So. Work undertaken today was moving mums.... We moved all the cascades with the boxtruck in the morning. Mums are fairly brittle and fragile, and the pots aren't light, so it took a degree of care. And then moved some of the bigger baskets in the afternoon with the bigger truck. It isn't exactly an easy task. Two to a truck and loaded by the bobcat.  There is a custom made Chrysanthemum production facility in the works which would be located next to the G33 houses in Longwood proper which would cut down on all the backwards and forwards driving. But well, it probably wont be completed for a few years yet. It is needed though! Apparently Yokos 1000 bloom mum will barely fit out the doors of her current glasshouse.

Some photos

Koa and his cascades