Freesia

Its been another successful season selling my freesia corms .

Its also been an unusual season as I would of had around the

 same amount of bulbs as in past seasons but this year I ran out with

another month of possible selling .

I guarantee that if I had of had the amount I have estimated that I would of

sold (if I had more) , it wouldn’t of happened that way.

My plants for the next season are growing really well so I will get some more photos

and show them on here.

Since the end of January I have been selling these bulbs very successfully on the New Zealand Trade Me ecomerce platform.I also have a listing on the dubli.com trading platform.

I sell them in lots of 100 and mixed colours.

Sadly I can only sell them in New Zealand with export restrictions and distance from international markets.

Once sold I package the bulbs up and courier them out to their final destination.

The freesia bulb will look a picture in any garden as they are vibrant colours and really look spectacular with  close plantings. The smell alone makes then worth while and  when I have them inside my house visitors tell me how lovely it is when they walk in the door.

Over the last couple of weeks I have been watering the bulbs so that the media is just kept damp and finishing any maintenance that has been needed.

My big problem now is this watering has encourgaged the weeds to grow in the trays so I am using a herbicide to keep them under control. I usually spray weekly  and this seems to control most of the problem.

My bulbs have started sprouting but I still continue spot spraying until I have quite a few bulbs up in each tray.

The freesia roots are quite shallow so any weeds I can kill while they are little is a bonus as trying to pull them out when they are bigger is inclined to dislodge the bulbs and this I dont want to happen

I had an empty greenhouse with hydroponic capabilities, and no
funds to plant  a specalist flower crop.
A friend suggested I buy a few freesia bulbs to see how they went
as the winter here is to cold to grow them succussfully outside.
I have always loved freesias so purchased a few different colours
to fill 90 trays( around 4,000 bulbs).
They thrived in the greenhouse in our conditions with the hot
summers to get them started, and the cold winter to get them
flowering. Its the frosts they dont like.
That first year all my neighbours and friends had a houseful of
beautiful scented flowers and it gave me the enthusiam to try the
commercial scene.After the flowers had died down the bulbs were
divided and separated as much as possible into colours and this
gave me enough to fill 270 trays
This was the starting of my commercial growing venture.

Freesias are amongst some of the loveliest spring flowers which are fragant and last well as a cut flower.

Freesias belong to the Iris family and have a long wiry stem bearing several flowers on  a one sided arching spike.They come in colours of white,cream or pink ,sometimes flushed with purple and yellow and are very fragrant.

 The  hybrid species that most of  mine are, include colours of cyclamen, purple, orange, and pink and grow on long stems. These varieties are not  quite as fragrant as the originals but are more popular and look spectacular in a vase

Crop supports are needed for flowering as they have a habit of falling over and also it makes it easier for cutting. I use two layers of support, one about 15cm off the soil to give support as they start growing and the other about 60cm  up then i can cut the flowers easily and also it gives easier access to take out any dead plant material

By staggering the plantings you will have a longer growing season and especially if you are supplying the commercial market this is a necessity