I had written this article before the devastating earth quake in Japan. My heart goes out to everyone that has been affected by this tragic event. When I saw the video of the greenhouses being washed away by the tsunami, I had to sit down. I have heard back from our friends in Japan, and the places that we’ve visited haven’t been directly impacted, and they are safe. I urge everyone to make a $10 donation to the redcross. No links no credit cards just use your cell phone and txt “REDCROSS” to 90999 and you’ll have made a ten dollar donation. Just a few seconds and your done, and it does make a difference.
This October I had a once in a lifetime opportunity to represent the United States as President of Garden Centers of America at the International Garden Center Association Congress in Japan. In attendance were two hundred and twenty garden center owners from sixteen different countries. The Congress was more than just a business meeting. It was a concentrated business study tour of Garden Centers, Public Gardens, and historic sites through out the Tokyo and Kyoto regions of Japan.
For me, this trip came fairly last minute. Garden Centers of America (GCA) became a member of the International Garden Center Association (IGCA) only in August of this year. Which also means that every member of GCA is now an individual member of the IGCA. The IGCA was established to provide a forum for the mutual exchange of information to exchange best practices, ideas, methods and experiences.
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Fox Face Solanum mammosum |
The flight to Japan was fourteen hours direct from Newark. It was strange to leave at 11:30 AM on Thursday and arrive at 2:30 PM on Friday. We didn’t pass through night at all. We had our business meeting the next day. At the meeting we compared how the industry was faring, and spoke about new trends. The thing that amazed me the most, actually it scared me a bit, was that it seemed that everyone all over the world had weather issues this year. Weather does effect how people garden. Usually if weather it really bad in one part of the world, it will be great in another. It didn’t seem like this pattern was the case this year. I hope we didn’t mess the world environment too badly, and that this is just a blip.
It was an early start the next morning. There were five busses on the tour. We shared our bus with quite a few garden center owners from the UK. One of the first things we noticed is that most of the homes we passed had very small yards. There are almost thirteen million people in Tokyo (compared to eight and a half million in NY.) Space is at a premium. So the actual space that is available to garden is relatively small.
After visiting several of the garden centers, I noticed a few extremely interesting trends. The first must be related to the smaller yards. Most of the sizes of plants that were available were in smaller size pots than in the US. There was quite a bit more color, and a larger variety of plants than are available in US garden centers in the fall. I think part of this is that gardening is more a part of there culture than it is in the states. From what I could determine online, their hardiness zone is about a zone 8, which would be similar to Southern Georgia.
There were lots of small potted plants that were covered with berries. We’ve been selling large potted purple berried callicarpa (beauty berry) for years, but I’ve never seen them available in four inch pots before. I was amazed that these four inch plants were covered with berries. There were other plants in berry in these tiny pots too. Some I recognized, but some I am still trying to find the correct botanic name. I would love to get a grower in the US to grow small pots of berried plants for fall containers. What a great way to add excitement, and also some height to a pot of pansies. Speaking of fruiting plants, one of the coolest new plants that I saw was called “Fox Face”. I had to ask several people at several different garden centers before I got the botanic name. Fox Face, Solanum mammosum, is a relative of the tomato and potato. It is a native of South America. It has large orange fruits that last for about three months. The fruits get their name because they resemble fox heads. These were in pots standing about three to four feet tall. This would be fantastic in fall container arrangements. Since they are in the nightshade family, I would not recommend eating them, as they could possibly be poisonous.
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Phalaenopsis Orchids are the easiest orchids to grow indoors. They’ve become extremely popular all around the world. When I first saw the orchids in the Japanese garden centers I was stunned. The Japanese Orchid growers use wires when the phalaenopsis are growing to train the flowers to look like giant waterfalls of flowers. They would put several plants in a pot, and the effect was beautiful. It was more like a living sculpture than a flowering plant. If I could have brought them home with me, I would have.
I can’t wait to put some of ideas that I got while I was there to use.
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