Urban aquaponics

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IryIOyPfTE A couple of posts ago we talked about "The kids are alright", in which a fellow nurseryperson came home to find "some kids that live in the same building decided to construct an aquaponics system in the basement." What can possible come from this?

In the industrial section of West Oakland "Eric Maundu is trying to farm is covered with freeways, roads, light rail and parking lots..." Imagine that one day this may supplement the food we get from "conventional" farms. When you see it in action it starts to make sense and you can imagine how we might just be able to pull this off. The video is about 18 minutes long.

Stop Stealing Dreams

So after I post the inspiring story yesterday concerning the Classroom Farm in the Bronx I was directed to an article in the NY Daily News. The article say's the program was terminated. According to the Daily News, "A celebrated classroom farm that yielded fresh produce and great jobs for students at a South Bronx public high school has been quietly shut down." It continues, "Green Bronx Machine withered last August when Ritz was moved to a basement classroom and told to stop growing food at Discovery". The Daily News says, "The city Department of Education referred questions to Discovery Principal Rolando Rivera, who failed to return repeated requests for an interview about why the program was shut down." Without the details it's hard to understand why the program was halted. Maybe a New York reader might have the answer? I do know our school system is broken. Here is a great video with Seth Godin that I watched right after watching the video on the school farm. What Seth say's dovetailed so well with what I saw in that Bronx video. It's called, "Stop stealing Dreams" It's 16 minutes well spent if your at all concerned with how the kids are being "educated" and what we can do about it. Seems the title, "Stop Stealing Dreams" fits well with the closing of the school program.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sXpbONjV1Jc

A teacher and students using horticulture to change their world

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lcSL2yN39JM&playnext=1&list=PL587786522B73DCBA&feature=results_video This is a great TEDx Talk featuring teacher Stephen Ritz and his Bronx classroom. According to the YouTube page, "With the help of extended student and community family they have grown over 25,000 pounds of vegetables in the Bronx while generating extraordinary academic performance. His Bronx classroom features the first indoor edible wall in NYC DOE which routinely generates enough produce to feed 450 students healthy meals and trains the youngest nationally certified workforce in America."

The future is now, and horticulture will play a huge role. Very cool.

What's trending in gardening

Every now and then it’s fun to look at what kind of gardening books are selling at Amazon. Gives a bit of insight into what people are looking for when it comes to their gardens. The last time we did this was September 2011. Let’s look at the top ten sellers and see if there is a theme (there is).

#1 Home Preserving

#2 Mini-farms, Self sufficiency on a ¼ acre

#3  The Foragers Harvest

#4  Marijuana Horticulutre

#5 Back to Basics

#6 The Farmers Almanac

#7 The Encyclopedia of Country Living

#8 All New Square Foot Gardening

#9  Nature's Garden: A Guide to Identifying, Harvesting, and Preparing Edible Wild Plants

# 10 Sunset Western Garden Book

Looks to me like it’s all about using the garden to feed, and sustain. The appearance of the two foraging books is an interesting addition. The marijuana book shows up perennially on the top 10 list. Number 11 is Aquaponics, a method for raising fish and plants together. We talked about in my last post.

Take away what you will from this. If you’re a garden center, it’s this kind of knowledge that can help you better understand your customer’s needs.  Maybe landscaping books and other ornamental books will one day return to the list, but for now it’s all about “growing you own”.

The kids are all right

A fellow nurseryperson in Missouri posted this photo on her Facebook page. She came home to find some kids that live in the same building decided to construct an aquaponics system in the basement. According to many in our trade, the young just don’t garden like their parents and grandparents did. This has affected the bottom line of many garden centers and nurseries around the world with many going out of business.

If you owned a garden center and some people came in wanting to build an aquaponics system, could you help them? What if they asked about growing lettuce hydroponically? What if they wanted to grow lettuce in soil inside under T5 lights? Where do you send them if you don’t carry this stuff? Why?

"Bionic Bee" robots pollenizing orchards?

According to China Dialogue, “In recent years, farmers have been forced to hand-pollinate their trees, carrying pots of pollen and paintbrushes with which to individually pollinate every flower, and using their children to climb up to the highest blossoms. This is clearly just possible for this high-value crop, but there are not enough humans in the world to pollinate all of our crops by hand.”

So along come Bionic bees! Wired Online has a story, “Engineers plan to upload bee brains to flying robots.” In the article we read that, “Engineers from the universities of Sheffield and Sussex are planning on scanning the brains of bees and uploading them into autonomous flying robots that will then fly and act like the real thing.” What will they do with these “Bionic Bees”? Engineers say they could “be used for a range of situations where tiny thinking flying machines should be more useful than current technology, which might mean seeking out gas or chemical leaks, or people who are trapped in small spaces. They might even help pollinate plants in places where natural bee populations have fallen due to the still-mysterious Colony Collapse Disorder.”

Bionic Bees pollinating food crops? Yes, and coming sooner than you think  to an orchard near you.

A bit of a stretch

Over at Southern Living Steve Bender known as "The Grumpy Gardener" has written an article titled, "Who wants to kill the birds?" It's about the recent fines Scotts Miracle-Gro received for selling poisoned bird seed.  In the article Steve say's, "Grumpy loves birds. He fills his feeder twice a day. So imagine his shock when he learned that Scott’s Miracle-Gro admitted to selling bird seed tainted with pesticides. Was Scott’s, the maker of a slew of popular lawn and garden products, in league with the devil? To find out, Grumpy paid the company a visit last week at their corporate headquarters in Marysville, Ohio."

It's great that Steve goes straight to the source for some investigative journalism. However, Steve mentions at the end of the article,  "Scott's paid my airfare and lodging for my visit. The Scott’s haters will immediately conclude that Grumpy was bought. Not so. I only agreed to hear Scott’s side of the story with no promise that I would report on it positively, negatively, or at all. Lots of companies in the garden industry send me stuff. If I try a product out and conclude that it’s good for my audience, I recommend it. If I don’t, you never hear about it."

Sure Steve.

Are those for real?

Yesterday The American Horticultural Society posted this picture of Clematis on their Facebook page. By the time I saw it many people had shared and linked to it. The problem? It’s a Photo-shopped picture, which a couple of people noticed and commented on at The Societies Facebook page. Then the post went missing. No explanation, just gone. I left a comment at the site asking what happened to it. The comment remains unanswered.

It’s very easy to be taken in by a photo like this since we are inclined by nature to “believe what we see”. When you remove a picture like this with no explanation one gets the impression that the folks at The Society are wishing it never happened. Why not just leave the photo up and fess up? I and many others had linked to the photo and now those links lead nowhere.

On The Internet what you do never really goes away. When you make a mistakle it’s best to just admit it and move on. Answer curious questions like mine. The pain of getting fooled will soon go away, and everyone can have a good laugh.

Rogue artists and organic graffiti

Back in March we talked a bit about Guerrilla Grafters, a group of people in The SF Bay Area who " collect branches from the California Rare Fruit Growers association or pick up donated branches from backyard gardeners and regional orchards. This bud stock is then grafted onto existing non-bearing trees like flowering pears." This is done without the knowledge or permission of the municipality that often oversees their care. Today in Boing-Boing Cory Doctorow say's, " The Guerrilla Grafters are a group of rogue artists who roam San Francisco, covertly grafting fruit-tree branches onto ornamental trees to create a municipal free lunch. John Robb calls it 'resilient disobedience.'"

Interesting to hear the grafters referred to as "rogue artists" and their actions as "civil disobedience". At Resilient Communities John Robb say's, "there’s a group of gardeners in San Francisco that are spreading organic graffiti across the city." "Organic Graffiti" is a term I had not heard before. So these people are not just wayward gardeners grafting bud stock onto street trees, they are "Rogue artists", spreading "Organic Graffiti" through their city.

This is a important change in the way we look at gardening. No longer just something grandma did to beautify her plot of land, but a movement of "rogue artists" spreading "organic graffiti". I think we will see more and more of this as people plant gardens in their front yards, often against the "rules".

Where do these guerrilla grafters get their inspiration, equipment, and knowledge? It's been quite a while since you could just walk in and buy a grafting tool, or budding tape at your local garden center. Is it bought mail order? Do any garden businesses actively court this trend. My guess is the local hydroponic shops, which are already courting "guerrilla gardeners" have the best chance to reach this group. We'll see.

We can grow that!

Back on September 4th I wrote a post titled, “You Can’t Grow That”. It concerned Scotts/Miracle Gro, and its trade marking the phrase, “You can gro that!” The problem was it was a phrase thought up by CL Fornari, nursery women and author. I wrote, “According to her website, garden writer CL Fornari decided last October to start a campaign titled, ‘You Can Grow That’. Once a week any garden writer who wished to participate would write an article under that heading… Long story short, Scotts/Miracle Gro applied for a trademark on “You Can Gro That!”, after she had broached the idea on The Internet.” Actually, the idea was first broached by C.L. in a "closed" garden center/nursery trade group on Facebook, and not just put out for anyone to see on The Internet.

The good news today is Scotts/Miracle Gro has backed off from the trade marking, leaving CL with her phrase to do as she pleases. Here is the story. It’s quite a turn around and something I wouldn’t have expected from the company. Something tells me it was social media and the avalanche of bad PR Scotts has received over the last year. Whatever the reason it’s nice to see Scotts/Miracle Gro do the right thing. It’s also fun to be a part of something that is changing for the better how we do business in the world of horticulture.

Organizing by not organizing

I read in the latest edition of “Today’s Garden Center” magazine an article titled “Slow Down”. Written by Sid Raisch of The Garden Center Group, it’s an interesting read concerning the changing garden retail landscape. What caught my eye was this. “Slow Retail Is Not Organized. There is no single controlling organization to the Slow movement. Its momentum is created worldwide by individuals who endorse and spread their passion that the Slow way is the better way.” This is the way it’s going to be going forward. Groups of like minded people connecting via The Internet and creating the change necessary to achieve their goals. Often the groups form without any real motivation or goals, but rather a shared interest. Soon themes may emerge that strike the groups fancy, and the group takes on a more proactive role. I see this in our trade group, Independent Garden Centers and Nurseries. Started as a place to just “talk shop”, it has morphed into a dynamic, action oriented group that is literally changing how business is being done in the horticultural world.

So rather than try and come up with a “plan of action”, such as the trade’s current fixation on creating "campaigns", use the “slow down” idea. Using “slow movement” thinking themes and ideas emerge through collaboration that can help the individual nurseries and garden centers who take part. Help the individual nursery do a better job, the customers will follow, and the “trade” will benefit. Actionable ideas that have a direct impact on the business, rather than a campaign which will have little or no effect on individual business. Guess I am just getting a bit tired of campaigns. So often it’s a forced movement that has no real underlying passion.

“Slow Gardening”, that’s something I can relate to. Our customers might ask, “I am already hungry for change in my life; show me how the garden can help. Help me slow down, and reconnect with the natural world. “ We ought to show the customers the benefit of doing business with us. That will really do something for our businesses.

If you’re an owner or employee of a independent garden center or nursery and want to join us go here.

To join our other trade group for nurseries, vendors, and garden media. Go here.

Honest dialogue

One of the goals with starting our Facebook page for retail garden centers, their vendors, and media was to foster open dialogue. So often it seems that the trade news we hear is a bit watered down. You don't get the feeling that your hearing what people really think. Much of the time it seems that traditional media has to walk a fine line between open dialogue, and their advertisers. Not at our Facebook page. When you wake up and check out the site you just never know who will be involved, and what is going to transpire. Today is one of those days. If you a garden center owner, employee, vendor, or garden media (this includes garden blogger's) you can join.  You will need a Facebook account. It is changing the trade as we know it. Don't miss out. Go here to join, and make a difference, and don't forget to make sure that somewhere on your Facebook page it indicates how you are involved in the gardening trade.

You cannot control the message

My last post concerning Scotts/Miracle-Gro's trademarking a phrase thought up by someone else brought us this comment from Robert Woodman, of The British Gardener. "I was in ‘shock and ore’ to read what Scotts has done with trade-marking ‘you can grow that’. I guess this is ‘the taste of a new generation’, but its not ‘M’m M’m good’. As a writer I like to ‘get ready to rumble’ but I want to ‘be all that you can be’ and choose my words carefully. Still this kind of stuff can ‘put a tiger in your tank’. Scotts ‘just do it’ attitude for their marketing doesn’t leave me with a ‘we love to see you smile’ feeling, but ‘it’s so easy, even a caveman can do it’. Sure it’s ‘taking care of business’ to come up with these slogans, but to rip it off from a blogger and prevent others from using it leaves me to think that Scotts is ‘Home of the Whopper’. ‘Have it your way’, we can show disapproval by buying from the competition, words that ‘melts in your mouth, not in your hands’. What ever happened to freedom of speech, doesn’t it extend to the written word as well as the spoken word? As always Trey, your blog is ‘good to the last drop’ when exposing ‘pork, the other white meat’."

It's as if by trademarking someone else's phrase you bring some of the enthusiasm and "mojo" that created the original idea to your business. It just doesn't work that way anymore. These days the customers are often the ones creating the content, via social media. That's the big news. You cannot control the message. People will talk about you, with or without your input.

Thanks to Robert for the entertaining comment.

You can't grow that!

Here is a story that shows just how quickly the horticultural industry in diverging into two different types of business. On the one hand we have smaller, independent garden professionals and on the other hand we have the larger concerns who seem terrified of what the smaller concerns are up to. How else does one explain Scotts/Miracle Gro's recent actions? According to her website, garden writer CL Fornari decided last October to start a campaign titled, “You Can Grow That”. Once a week any garden writer who wished to participate would write an article under that heading. You can read about it here. Long story short, Scotts/Miracle Gro applied for a trademark on “You Can Gro That!”, after she had broached the idea on The Internet.

What’s up with Scotts? At a recent shareholders meeting in January 2012, Chairman and CEO Jim Hagedorn said, "We are making a step change in fiscal 2012 and setting a new benchmark for our advertising investment," Hagedorn told shareholders. "Both our Scotts and Miracle-Gro brands will be supported by completely new campaigns. While we will continue to support individual products in each commercial, we will do so with a consistent approach and message that creates a halo effect for the brands. I believe this is some of the best creative work we have done in years and I am confident it will impact our business – not just in 2012 – but over the longer-term as well."

Then last August Scotts reported, “During today's conference call to discuss its third quarter results, the Company said it expects adjusted earnings for fiscal 2012 to be approximately $2.00 per share and mistakenly stated an expected loss in the fourth quarter of about 40 cents. To clarify, the Company anticipates an operating loss in the fourth quarter which will translate into an adjusted loss per share closer to 60 cents. The Company still expects adjusted earnings per share of about $2.00 for the year.”

Like all of us, Scotts is trying to figure out its place in the changing gardening scene. Its reputation has taken a beating these last few years, and people just don’t seem to want to garden in a way that helped build the company in the past. Garden centers no longer feel it necessary to carry their products, as there are better alternatives now available. Lawns are slowly loosing favor with the gardening public, and lawn care is where Scotts ruled. Finally, through actions like trade marking a phrase, “You can grow that” it shows a certain un-becoming characteristic. It seems destined to alienate itself even further from the very people it would normally count on for support, garden writers and their readers.

Building the virtual trade show

While it would be nice if everyone could attend trade shows like The IGC Show in Chicago, the fact is not everyone can. To help those who cannot make some of these trade shows we developed a Facebook page, IGC Marketplace for vendors and buyers to connect. Have  a service or product you would like to see sold at Independent Garden Centers? Are you a nursery person looking for ideas and products that will differentiate your store from the rest? Our page might just be the answer. The future of independent garden centers is being built in forums and pages just like this.  The IGC Marketplace is the only member run marketplace for the garden trade in the world. Why not give it a try? Go here to check it out. Kind of like a virtual trade show. Plus, we have that really cool logo.