Acre-for-acre, flowers are the most profitable--as well as the most beautiful--crop on the farm. In The Flower Farmer expert flower grower Lynn Byczynski provides a complete introduction to raising a cornucopia of cut flowers for home use and for sale to retail customers, florists, and other markets. The book offers detailed, manageable plans for flower growing on a scale ranging from a backyard border to a half-acre commercial garden. It will appeal to a broad spectrum of readers, including: * Home gardeners who want ...
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Acre-for-acre, flowers are the most profitable--as well as the most beautiful--crop on the farm. In The Flower Farmer expert flower grower Lynn Byczynski provides a complete introduction to raising a cornucopia of cut flowers for home use and for sale to retail customers, florists, and other markets. The book offers detailed, manageable plans for flower growing on a scale ranging from a backyard border to a half-acre commercial garden. It will appeal to a broad spectrum of readers, including: * Home gardeners who want growing tips from professionals, so that they can enjoy an abundance of flowers year-round in fresh and dried bouquets * Passionate gardeners and small-scale growers who want to raise and sell cut flowers in season for additional income * Small commercial farmers who want to increase farm revenue or even make a living from selling field-grown, specialty cut flowers. The Flower Farmer provides a clear, realistic look at both the benefits and the challenges of growing flowers organically for local markets. Chapters include information on: * The best varieties of cut flowers--an A-Z list of more than one hundred recommended annuals and perennials, spotlighting the cultivars that are grown by professional flower farmers * How to cut, store, and preserve flowers for long-lasting beauty * How to dry flowers for crafting or for a dried-flower business * Flower-arranging basics from a designer's perspective * Extending the season with woody shrubs and trees * Marketing options for commercial growers, including sales at farmer's markets, supermarkets, florists, and wholesalers. Sprinkled throughout are profiles of successful flower farmers--from Vermont to California, Texas to Wisconsin--each of them providing a unique perspective proving that growing flowers can be as profitable as it is satisfying.
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Add this copy of The Flower Farmer: an Organic Grower's Guide to Raising to cart. $33.01, good condition, Sold by Bonita rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Newport Coast, CA, UNITED STATES, published 1997 by Chelsea Green Publishing.
Add this copy of The Flower Farmer: an Organic Grower's Guide to Raising to cart. $78.45, new condition, Sold by GridFreed rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from North Las Vegas, NV, UNITED STATES, published 1997 by Chelsea Green Publishing.
Add this copy of The Flower Farmer: an Organic Grower's Guide to Raising to cart. $93.40, new condition, Sold by Bonita rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Newport Coast, CA, UNITED STATES, published 1997 by Chelsea Green Publishing.
The author spends a great deal of time telling you how to plant, transplant, fertilize, etc. She spends way too much space on basics of horticulture. Surely, anyone interested in selling flowers already knows how to grow them! The Ball RedBook would be a better reference for plant-specific growing advice. This book has extensive information about marketing and field yields, but I would take her advice with a grain of salt. I do not agree with some of her calculations and her other information is so far off the mark that I do not trust her opinions in this regard either.
The best info in this book is from her "case studies". The farmers she interviews give good information about their methods and mistakes, but very few specifics about the most important topic: preservation. Just as top chefs will alter recipes so that no one can duplicate their materpieces exactly, most flower growers are very tight-lipped about their secrets and will write pages and pages without giving specifics. This book is true to form. "Proper contitioning" tips go no farther than adding sugar or asprin, or buying commercial (and expensive!) potions.
My greatest complaint has to do with her guide to cut flowers at the end of the book. Some flowers that keep beautifully (after conditioning) are dismissed as having "no vase life". For example: Poppies and Cleome are dismissed as lasting a day or two, but using certain methods my Cleome lasted 2 WEEKS in the vase and won a blue ribbon at the county fair, and poppies can fetch $5 a stem and last 7-10 days if you do it right. "Flowers for Sale" by Lee Sturdivant has much better conditioning and plant selection information.
