11/01/2024
This year I have decided not to grow tulips. It’s a decision that I have been waffling on the last few years. And here’s why……..
Every fall for the last eight years, I have slugged it out in the rain and cold planted thousands upon thousands of imported tulip bulbs, they are the one crop that I grow that I don’t feel aligns with my sustainability principles and for me that needs to change.
#1 As a cut flower, tulips are harvested bulb and all, then the bulbs are thrown away. The bulbs are bulky, heavy and have a substantial environmental footprint to ship them around the world.
#2 They are plagued by botrytis, a fungus, specifically fire blight, so production often uses increasingly more fungicides ( which I choose not to use)
#3 They just aren’t all that profitable. By the time we calculate the cost of product, planting, loss due to rot, rodent or disease there just isn’t enough profit to cover the costs and some years being a total loss.
#4 Market flooding, tulips ripen all at once for the most part, and our small farm finds itself up against large growing operations that sell for cheaper, in the past I have tried to offset set this by growing specialty varieties, but with all the flooding in holland and poor bulb production, increased cost and use of fertilizer, it’s just a losing game.
The sad part is tulips are the flower of May, one of the few… it’s a challenging month for flower growers.
If you are a flower farmer, have you had the same internal debate?
I’m up for the challenge! Creative sustainability is what it’s all about.
