Q: What are you gossiping about now?

A:  The Dirt! No gossip involved - just the facts about one of the most important
 elements of growing your flowers - our good, old fashioned dirt. 

Q: Would you care to expound on “your” dirt? 

 A: I thought you’d never ask. Proper soil types and specific preparations are
game changers when it comes to quality flowers. The dirt is crucial to the
success of our Sunflowers as well as our other flowers and greens.  

Q: Some foo foo wine growers often refer to the importance of Terroir?  What’s that?

A: That’s “The Dirt” (we can get foo foo too!) Terroir is a French term when
translated means: earth, or soil. Many wine growers extrapolate the term terroir
to also mean, soil, climate and topography of the land. We need all these inputs
as well but first we start with the dirt.   

Q: Do you guys do anything special for your dirt?

A: You know us. Of course we do. We take soil samples yearly, send them off
to a lab to be analyzed and then we amend the soil as needed.  For example,
 Sunflowers are heavy feeders, so they need a nutrient rich, slightly
acidic soil, so we need to the PH to around 7.

Q: Any other fun facts?

A: You know it! Here are just a few:
 
  1. There are more microorganisms in a handful of dirt than there are people on earth.
2.It takes 500 years to produce just under an inch of topsoil which is the most productive layer dirt. 
3. Dirt is a living system called a heterogenous mixture and consists of 45% minerals, 25% water, 25% air and 5% organic matter.
4. And, most importantly of all, dirt is at the bottom of the food chain, yet it is the cornerstone of life on earth.

Tried and true – our best-selling Sunflower.

We start at the very beginning.

Then we bring in the “heavy” equipment.

Once the dirt is ready we start planting.
 (Yes, much of our plantings are still done by hand.)  

Healthy plants…a sign that our dirt preparation is correct and working.

Two examples of what we always hope is the end result. 
 This first picture is of Sunflowers at what we call cut stage one
 as they nearly closed which is the perfect time to harvest them. 

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