Bobby Green’s Camellias

Plants Nouveau is so excited to be representing Bobby Green’s Camellia breeding.

Bobby Green is a landscape designer and owner of Green Nurseries in Fairhope, AL., a wholesale nursery specializing in Camellias, winter-interest plants, and rare and scarce plants. He encourages the wider use of camellias by emphasizing their versatility in the garden. His grounds have become a repository for rare and endangered camellia cultivars salvaged from long-abandoned nurseries and gardens. Bobby designed the recently-opened Wintergarden, at the Mobile Botanical Gardens. He also provides research and consultation services toward restoring historic camellia gardens.

While in college studying archeology, Bobby discovered working the afternoons at his dad’s nursery was more interesting than the voluminous books on sociology. He proclaimed, “Hey, I just wanted to dig in the dirt! ” So when he proudly announced his intention to enter the nursery business his father’s good advice went unheeded. “Go to law school (his uncle and grandfather were lawyers), grow plants for a hobby.” Thirty five years later he’s still on the farm.

In Bobby’s words:

“It wasn’t the plants that were so intriguing to me as a child; in fact, their demanding habits were often placed between me and the baseball game down the block. It was the old things. The abandoned tools of the 1940s that had been used to raise the camellias. . . the old grafting jars, large and small in many different colors. . . the label-making machine capable only of producing a handful of tags an hour. . . the “tree cart” that was often used as a stagecoach or chariot as my nurseryman father indulged my sisters and me. But the most mysterious of all was the “Rototiller” — 1947 model, a monstrous seven-foot-long, 2-cycle, 16-horsepower machine that could turn the hardest clay soil to fluff.

My love of old things eventually and naturally extended into the garden itself. And what could be more interesting to study but the camellia? Here were actual living architectural artifacts! Crawling beneath old shrubs, once tended by gardeners now long-gone, could give you an insight into the gardener’s own spirit, with his labels frugally made from discarded Budweiser cans. The gardener/tool and die maker would stamp the heavy aluminum tags with care, and they remain as legible today as they were 40 years ago. Some labels, made by well-meaning amateur spellers, were so vague as to be almost in code.

Better than any other Southern shrub, the camellia can link gardeners with generations of the past. “My grandmother planted that camellia”, or “My uncle rooted that Japonica” are still commonly heard phrases.

Gardeners would like to think of their work as achieving some form of immortality, but of course a garden is a very fragile creature. Certain plants, however, seem immortal but for the hand of Man. I have rarely seen an old camellia die from any disease except “progress”. Personally, I am indelibly linked to my father by his camellias, some planted as early as 1932. As children, we would bring armloads of camellias into the house, and my father would rattle off the names: ‘Coletti’, ‘Marjorie Magnificent’, ‘Donckelarri’. My father died in 1982, and it seems he took many of his loves with him: opera, bad jokes, Nero Wolfe mysteries. But every winter I can still walk through the garden with him as he points out ‘Lindsey Neill’ and ‘Rose Dawn’.

And that other link: the Rototiller — that hopelessly obsolete machine from the past? Every year or two I wrestle it from its cave, and clean the carburetor. A little new gas and three or four pulls and it sputters to life again, belching enough blue smoke to make Al Gore’s eyes water as far away as Washington. It careens around in circles, pulling my spare frame behind it. After five minutes of this ritual, I somewhat sadly wrestle the beast back into its cave, vowing that one day I’ll clean and renovate the machine that so faithfully helped put food on the table through nine presidents.

Sentimentality is a common link among all gardeners, both a comfort and a curse. I owe a great debt to my father for teaching me about camellias — and of course, for not throwing out the Rototiller.”

— Robert M. Green Jr

Bobby is pictured here with his wife and business partner Debbie.

Bobby’s camellias will mostly be sold through the Southern Living Plant Collection.  Some may be independently sold, like Camellia heimalis ‘Susy Dirr’.

The Kolster Company was founded in 1944 in Boskoop, Holland (The Netherlands) during WW2 by Peter’s grandfather. They sold shrubs for landscaping. He was a poor man, with nine children.  Three of his children worked as unpaid help in the nursery, as was commonly the case back then.

As you can imagine, there was little to sell during the war. Travel was done on bicycle and deliveries made by a cycle carrier. Sadly, Peter’s grandfather died unexpectedly at the age of 56 in 1952. This was the same year Peter was born. Peter’s father and uncles carried on in the business, making it a success, and growing it much larger over the years.

In 1970, at the young age of 18, Peter was asked to manage the nursery because one of his uncles had to leave the business. He loved the propagation of plants and was happy to manage the day-to-day responsibilities while his father travelled, selling their plants throughout Europe.

In the early 90’s mixed bouquets became popular all over the world.  Peter recognized some of the berries and decorative leaves in the bouquets as the precise plants his father sold to the landscape trade. He saw huge possibilities in the cut flower industry and began researching and trialing shrubs of all kinds to be used for cuts.

Peter always managed to stay ten steps ahead of the competition. He started breeding first for cuts, and then in 2000, they began breeding for the gift or pot crop market. The breeding started small, but today he has a full time breeder on staff and cooperates exclusively with several outside breeders.  They also collaborate with several small companies who are also breeding.

The Kolster Company now has licensed growers in more then 70 countries, all over the world. Peter doesn’t make the crosses anymore. He is the “idea man” – offering technical support and setting up new business relationships, traveling 1/3 of the year to visit clients and agents.  He still loves to be involved on the breeding side, and he helps to guide the breeders and make selections every year.

Under his watch, the business has grown, but it still remains a family-owned business.
Aside from Peter and his wife Tiny, The Kolster Company is now owned by his two sons Robert-Jan and Martin, his brother-in-law Arno Nolet, and one former employee, Wouter den Hollander.

When he is not traveling to world forging new partnerships and overseeing the direction of the breeders and the company, Peter loves to spend time with his two grandchildren.  He’s a granddad who loves to play and teach them about the wonders of nature, so they adore him.  Peter also says his work is his hobby, so he loves to travel and look for new plants and to dabble in some breeding here and there all the time.   Peter often enjoys a long, leisurely bike ride with his dog at his side when he’s not off traveling.  He loves his family a lot and can’t wait to spend time with them.

As for sons Robert-Jan and Martin, Robert-Jan enjoys gardening and a good glass of wine.  He’s got quite the sense of humor too, always cracking jokes. And Martin is the soccer player in the family.  He spends his free time training and scoring lots of goals as the center forward for his team in the Netherlands.

Some of the new plants we are representing from Kolster are:

The Everlasting Series of Hydrangea
Hypericum Magical Desire
Weigelia Rainbow Sensation

Camellia hiemalis ’Susy Dirr’ PPAF

During the OFA Short Course last week, we unveiled one of our newest introductions, a Camellia to benefit Cystic Fibrosis and the daughter of one of Horticulture’s great teachers.  We had Sweet Melissa 4 Susy cause bracelets made and passed them out for a $1 donation to the Sweet Melissa fund. One of the largest expenses someone with Cystic Fibrosis can encounter is a lung transplant.  The Sweet Melissa Fund collects donations to help CF patients defer some of the cost.

Susy Dirr,  daughter of Dr. Michael and Bonnie Dirr, was born with cystic fibrosis, which makes the act of breathing a life and death struggle.

Dr. Michael Dirr is one of the most famous woody plantsmen in the US.  He wrote and published many versions of his Manual of Woody Landscape Plants, a textbook  that has been used by horticulture students, master gardeners and plant lovers all over the world.  The original is still sitting on my shelf.  It was my one and only college textbook for the Woody Plants 101 course I took while earning my degree in Plant Science at the University of Delaware.  I still use it and I believe it’s one of the only text books I still reference from college.

Undaunted by her disease, Susy was valedictorian of her high school class and an honor student at the University of GA, graduating with a degree in advertising a year ahead of her class. Cystic fibrosis did not define Susy as a person. She embraced life with a joyful spirit that was uplifting to everyone around her. She made the world a better place with her compassion for others, her biting wit and brilliant mind. When a soul shines so bright, we see it in all things beautiful.

So, as summer fades and hints of autumn are in the air, reflections of these lovely flowers, graceful in form and with the sweet fragrance of newly opened tea, begin to fill our senses. We reflect on Susy’s life and know that a part of her spirit remains with us in the garden.

Bobby Green, the breeder of this Camellia has generously gifted his portion of  the royalties  from each plant to the Sweet Melissa Fund, which helps families with cystic fibrosis.Visit http://sweetmelissafund.org for more information.

This new hardy, fall blooming camellia is a robust grower in containers in the nursery and in the garden. It’s a full, bushy plant with a dense habit, and elegant, formal double carmine pink flowers.

For Gardeners

No other species has contributed more to the garden than C. hiemalis, the winter sasanqua. Attractive all year, and hardier than most of its cousins, these shrubs blend harmoniously with other textures and offer a plethora of flowers in Sept-Oct. Susy Dirr does that and more. The voluptuous, bubble-gum pink blooms put on a show stopping tribute, honoring an exquisite young woman who was the essence of all things beautiful.

For Growers

Camellia hiemalis, often called the dwarf sassanqua, is the lesser known relative to the more popular Camellia sassanqua.   C. hiemalis is fall blooming as well, but more cold hardy than it’s cousin.  Some of these new selections have proven hardy in USDA Zone 6, but we are saying zone 7 to be safe.  Liners are available to Licensed Growers.

The drawing above  of the Camellia ‘Susy Dirr’ flower will appear on all of our promototional pieces for this plant.  Our friend and amazing illustrator, Steve Asbell in Florida drew this for us.  If you ever need anything drawn, we would highly recommend Steve’s work.  Not only is he humble and an incredible artist, he’s easy to work with and a really nice guy.

Until then…Happy Weeding,

Angela Treadwell-Palmer
Co-Owner, Plants Nouveau

Here’s an article of mine that was just published in the Ohio Florists’s Association (OFA) Bulletin.  I thought you might get a kick out of reading my current thoughts on Social Media and why I think we need (as an industry) need to get to start paying more attention tothis, quick-like!

I’d like to talk about three very important things that are currently affecting our industry.

1.Social media is here to stay…

Perhaps it is a dirty word to some of you, but it is something you should start paying attention to – pronto!

Can you guess one of the biggest industries embracing social media?

It’s pizza. That’s right, take-out pizza. Dominoes and Pizza Hut have the two hippest, most happening, truly beloved social media campaigns right now.

Are you going to tell me people NEED pizza? They need pizza way less than they NEED plants. So, why are these companies so successful when folks have less money to spend? Not to mention the fact that I think they both have pretty bad pizza. They’re buying more pizza than ever and having fun doing it. Social media has built Dominoes and Pizza Hut quite a community.

To all the industry folks out there saying people have no money for plants – it’s not true. They have money to stand in line for a meal at the Cheesecake Factory on weekends – a long line, and the food isn’t cheap, but there’s always a line, isn’t there?

They are buying. There are fewer people buying and their buying habits have changed, but they are buying.

What do you mean there are fewer people buying? That brings us to #2.

2. Population shift…

Ever hear of the Baby Boom? Anyone born from 1947 to 1964 is part of a huge population boom. The front end of that boom is heavily loaded with people. The back end declines quite a bit. We are currently 3 years into a population decline curve that will last for the next 17 years. That’s right, I said the population will continue to decline for the next 17 years.

It’s true. There were so many more babies born during that time, more than in any other time frame in American history. And that aging segment of the population has a collective discretionary income that will not be seen again for a long time, if ever – once they stop spending money or cut back on spending.

Here’s the reason. Baby boomers didn’t produce as many kids, therefore Generation X, and the next few generations don’t have as many people, and as the boomers retire and downsize to smaller houses or condos, they have less space for plants, and you know what that means, don’t you? Their buying habits will change.

We need to figure out how to sell them plants even when they don’t have a garden. What’s more, younger folks, like Generation Y and beyond are either choosing to live in urban communities in smaller spaces or those that wanted a house in the suburbs with a yard can’t get loans as easily from the banks, so they’re choosing a smaller abode, with no yard, smack dab in the middle of the city.

Will they garden? We hope so, but in what way? If they have little or no outdoor space, what kind of garden will they have?

There’s a cultural shift in the lifestyle of people in the United States; a cultural shift in the way they get their information, the way they buy, how far they will travel to buy something, and the way they live and use plants.

This is not a fad, it’s reality and it truly is a shift in our culture like none we’ve ever seen. The way consumers shop and live might be changing forever. Even more, there will be less of them in the future. How do we convince them to continue to spend their money on our products? Industry consultants have been telling us for years that the 55-year-old woman is our best customer. What happens when she moves into a condo or a retirement community where she has little space to garden? Will she continue to buy plants? The answer is yes, but we have to reach her with a new message. We need a message that reminds her how happy plants make her, one that re-educates her about the benefits of growing plants, and finally, a message that challenges her to shift her former gardening reality to a smaller space.

What about the younger folks? Same message here. This time, it’s not re-educating – it’s educating for the first time. Younger generations understand being healthy and they want more than anything to do what’s right for the planet. Gardening isn’t just for looks. Gardening feeds you, it cleans the air, and it nourishes your soul.

This is an entirely new message, and that brings us to #3.

3. Shopping locally

People are shopping more locally. Some do it to support local communities. Some do it to save gas and wear and tear on the environment. Some do it because it saves time, but it’s a fact that more people, especially younger people, are shopping locally.

People want to shop in their community. Not only the community they live in, but their social community. Social media is all about community. Do you have a community of young folks as well as retired, downsized customers?

Do you have a dedicated community of followers who think you are the expert in everything there is to know about plants, a community that respects your business and comes to you first? OR – are you still talking to the same customers with the same old message?

I bet you don’t. I’ve looked at all the big websites and Facebook pages for lots of the nurseries and garden centers. I subscribe to every e-letter I can find. I delete most of them now because they’re boring. And most of the Facebook pages are so lack-luster and without personality that they have no following. Has everyone in the nursery industry lost their will to be creative and innovative? Why is it taboo to show some personality? There are a few examples of companies with personality, but why aren’t there more?

If you want to be in business five years from now, you MUST embrace the online/social world or you will be on the ever-growing lists of bankruptcies and closings.

Furthermore, if you ignore the population shift and don’t immediately start marketing your business to the next generation of buyers and in a different way than to your current buyers who may have less space to garden, you’re just as likely to fail.

This is the biggest cultural shift since the industrial revolution. Did you know?

• More than 50 percent of the world’s population is under 30 years old.

• 96 percent of all Millennials have joined a social network

• Facebook tops Google for weekly traffic in the United States

• Social media has overtaken porn as the #1 activity on the web

• 80 percent of companies use social media for recruitment, and 95 percent of those are using LinkedIn

Here’s the kicker. This is what most people don’t know….

• The fastest growing segment on Facebook is 55- to 65-year-old women.

Isn’t that the “golden” group of customers everyone talks about? Isn’t this the group with money to spend? Aren’t these the ones who already shop in garden centers? Isn’t this the group they tell you to keep and concentrate on? Isn’t this the group that isn’t hip enough to be a part of social media?

Facts are facts.

They may be on Facebook because they want to see what their kids or grandkids are doing. They may be connecting with old colleagues and classmates and childhood friends, but the bottom line is…they’re there in force, and they are looking for interaction. They are looking to be engaged, to share ideas, and to learn something new and exciting.

If they’ve downsized, they are looking to you for ideas on how to garden on their small balcony or just enhance their windowsill. This is a whole new scenario. They need help and they are craving suggestions.

These are currently your best customers, right? So why aren’t you engaging them there?

What about the next generation?

Did you know 78 percent of consumers trust peer recommendations and only 14 percent trust advertising? What are peers saying about your store? What are they saying about your brand?

This is all happening right now and it will grow exponentially in the future. Potential customers will no longer need to search for products and services. Products and services will find the customers and tell them what they NEED. Don’t you want your store to be the one to teach them something new and earn their business?

Why is the garden center and nursery industry still waiting to hear what the customers want? Why not follow the food and fashion industry? Here’s an idea…make them think they need our products. Make it so they can’t live without them. Make it a convenient, fun, easy, exciting and rewarding shopping experience.

Show people without gardens how to garden. Show them the benefits of a flowering potted plant and teach them it’s OK if it dies. It served its purpose, right? In European villages, community members shop their local village garden shop. They buy a potted flowering plant or a bouquet of fresh cut flowers each time they go – and they shop weekly. Why is American culture so different? I know people have an ingrained need to nurture something, but some crops were meant to nurture us. Once they’ve done their part, let them go. They made you happy for a few weeks, right? It’s OK…really.

Sell cut flowers? Market them as an emotional pick-me-up, a boost for well-being.  Stop marketing cut flowers to men. Most men give a bouquet of cuts for special occasions only. Sure, some expect something in return, wink-wink, but that’s not real life anymore. Market them to women. Everyone should have a fresh cut bouquet once a week. It’s healthy and it truly does improve quality of life.

I heard a great quote from Pete Johnson, of Pete’s Greens, an organic Vermont vegetable supplier to most of the northeast. He said, “People are not going to change their lifestyles. We need to figure out how to take our products to them.” In other words, people who want to eat healthy and support local farmers don’t have time to go to visit farm after farm picking up meat, dairy, eggs, and produce. If we want them to support us we need to make it easier. We need to get the products to them. They are busy. If local village shops did cooperative buying from local farmers, consumers could easily enjoy healthy, farm fresh products. That’s how grocery stores got started, right? What happened?

Should we apply some of this to garden centers?  Is the destination garden center a thing of the past? How will it survive if the customer of the future wants to shop locally? There’s no time on the weekends to drive 45 minutes to the nearest mega garden center, so people wind up shopping at a big box, or an IGC with multiple, smaller locations in many towns because it’s near the grocery store or other shopping.

I think the solution is smaller centers with fresh crops each week and something different to look at. We strive to have everything in one place and to be everything to everyone. That’s how we overwhelm non-gardeners and even experts. What if we position them in a shopping center close to community shopping? Give them fresh stuff to sell each week and make it seasonal? There’s nothing stopping one big, destination garden center from having five smaller shops located in the communities and centers where people do their other weekly shopping that are stocked with fresh material each week. I bet if you have 5 products and loads of each thing, you’ll sell more. It works for Costco.

In Europe, it’s hard to tell the difference between florists and garden centers. They are combined into one. Each village shop sells ornamental plants, houseplants, flowering potted “gift” plants and fresh cut flowers. What’s stopping us?

The geeky gardeners will always want specialty items, so have a specialty section for the plant geeks, but focus the rest of the store on fresh, quality, seasonal products, and education.

I want to help this industry and I know some of these ideas are way outside of everyone’s box, but pushing the limit and dreaming of better ways is what I do.  I love the people and the products and I truly believe we are selling an item that makes people happy and healthy. We just need to convince the customers…

The world has changed. It’s our turn to change.

Here’s a fun little video I use in my lectures to get the point across about the power of social media.

Enjoy!

Thanks for reading and happy weeding!

PS.  If you’d like to read more articles by angela – sign up for The Weeding Gnome, her e-newsletter here.

The Peeps Behind the Plants – Fall in Love with Natives

Each breeder has a place in my heart and the relationships we’ve formed over the new plants they allow me to market, run deep.  I love my breeders and I feel it’s my job is to make them famous.

We begin with a Pharoah. Meet my good friend… Sinclair A. Adam, Jr.

I’ve known of Sinclair since my days as a student at The University of Delaware.  His name and the name of the nursery he started came up many times while I was studying landscape design, though I never got to meet him in person.  It seemed all of my professors knew this famed nurseryman.

It’s no surprise with his 30+ years experience in horticulture, and herbaceous plants, that everyone would know him. Sinclair has taught at The University of Vermont, Brandywine Conservancy, The Brandywine Valley Association, Longwood Gardens, The Barnes Foundation, and Temple University. He established Dunvegan Nursery in 1989, which was owned and operated by Sinclair and his wife Kirsten. Today, Sinclair and Kirsten manage and breed for Vermont Organics in St. Albans, VT.

Sinclair has presented a number of topics in horticulture at ASHS, IPPS, PPA, The New England Greenhouse Conference, US National Arboretum, and other venues, and he holds Degrees in Plant Science from University of Wyoming & University of Vermont.

Kirsten also has 20+ years of experience in horticulture, a BA in Art History from University of Vermont, and a reputation for her skillful and efficient propagation techniques, and resulting crop quality.

How did we meet?

One day, after I started Plants Nouveau, I received an email from Sinclair with pictures of some tiarellas, asking me if I thought they were interesting?

It wasn’t a long email.  I immediately replied, “yes!”

A simple beginning to our long and hopefully beneficial foamflower follies…

I’ve had the extreme pleasure getting to know Sinclair and his wife Kirsten over the past few years.  They are an amazing couple.  They truly believe in what they are doing.

Sinclair is one of those guys who you would love to sit back and relax with on the porch, debate politics or even contemplate the future over a good sipping scotch.  He’s got an amazing brain, he’s incredibly clever, yet irreverent on occasion and hanging out with him is jolly good fun.

I’m proud to be representing Sinclair in the exclusive introduction of his newly selected line of ground covering foamflowers, The River Series.

Sinclair’s passion for breeding with native plants is known throughout the industry by such innovative introductions as Tiarella ‘Erika Leigh’, ‘Laird of Skye’, ‘Brandywine’ and ‘Oakleaf’.

In Sinclair’s own words:

“Ever since I was young I have loved plants, their fruits, flowers, and fragrance. My introduction to plants originally came from my father, and was augmented by both of my grandmothers.”  When things calm down after the rush of spring, in the evenings (and on occasional weekends) we like to sail our lovely PA lakes, and explore the wilds. People in horticulture are great folks, and when time permits we enjoy spending time with our friends (from horticultural and otherwise), as well as listening to music, reading great books, and exploring nature.”

Sinclair’s Mission: To save the world one plant at a time.

Many in the industry refer to Sinclair as the honorable Pharaoh of Foamflowers.  I think the name fits quite well. His love of native plants and his passion for finding solutions to common landscape problems like water and pollinator conservation as well as finding substitutes for commonly invasive plants has put a depth into his plant selection process that doesn’t exist in many other breeding programs.

Who would have thought that delicate little foamflowers could help to increase declining bee populations?

Up to ten different bee species visit tiarellas, so adding foamflowers to your home garden increases the pollen for bees.  More bees means better pollination for necessary food crops.

Sinclair and I share a passion for native plants and selections (now referred to as Nativars) of those natives.  We both believe that if you have an improved selection, perhaps, just perhaps, you’ll be able to more easily convince people who don’t like native plants because they think they are “weedy”, that natives can be beautiful too.

If you can hook someone on natives, they will soon discover the glory that is native plants.  No, they are not easier to grow and no they are certainly not “no care”.

What plant is?

I did a great rant on that very subject titled “Natives are Easier. Yeah, Right!” that was republished in Garden Rant and commented on (positively…) by many.

If you love natives or want to give them a try, starting with something as fail safe as the River Series is where I’d begin.  Sinclair’s breeding makes it easy to fall in love with natives.

There are five selections in the River Series; ‘Delaware‘, ‘Lehigh‘, ‘Octoraro‘, ‘Susquehanna‘ and ‘Wissahickon‘.  Each has it’s own use and character.

The favorites from my hot, incredibly dry, shady Baltimore garden are Octoraro and Delaware. I’ve got Octoraro going now up here in the new Massachusetts trials and hope to pick up a few more selections when I visit this week.

In my opinion, Octoraro is the most drought tolerant and the best ground cover in this series for dry shade. Octoraro grows four to six inches tall and covers up to 24 inches of ground making it the perfect, native substitute for English periwinkle in dry or moderately wet shade. Thick flower stalks hold mauve-pink buds that open to creamy, light pink blooms from early May to July.

Delaware has the largest, roundest leaves with subtle, deep purple markings. Delaware grows four to six inches tall and spreads to 18 inches wide in one season. Prolific, light pink blooms from late April to June are held high above the foliage on dark red stems.

Sinclair’s newest additions are to the Diva-rella Series.  ‘Stephanie Cohen’ is the first introduction.

Next time we’ll get to know Peter Kolster and his family, of Kolster B.V. in The Netherlands a little better.  Find out what attracted them to breeding super exciting, game changing hydrangeas.

Happy fall colors and Happy Weeding!

Angela Treadwell-Palmer
Co-Owner, Plants Nouveau