| |
Written by: Mohyuddin Mirza
Bedding Plants and Ornamentals:
April is the most exciting part for this sector of the industry. This is the time when plants are in bloom and sales have started for the “spring itchy” consumers. The greenhouses I visited are full of geraniums, pansies, petunias, asters and many other plants both in cell packs and in hanging baskets. The types of containers in which plants are grown keep on changing constantly. It appears that this will be another big year for the containers. Consumers like to buy plants which are already blooming, so that there is instant gratification. In the time of stress, different coloured flowers provide a good relief. People have preferences for colors, so many times growers try to blend many colors in the same pot.
This year, I am expecting more vegetable containers. Besides traditional patio tomatoes, I have seen mini cucumbers trained on trellis, peppers and lettuce. Many growers have reported great success with simple 3-5 litre containers with 3 lettuce plants inside. So it all depends on your imagination. Remember that it is important to maintain good fruit set and leaf quality on these containers.
Few issues here and there are seen. This is iron deficiency in petunia caused by an alkaline pH in the growing medium. Basically the plants themselves change the pH of the growing medium towards alkalinity. Plants like geraniums change the pH towards more acidic side. So growers must adjust their fertilizing practices so that pH of the solution is according to plant conditions. Consumers would not pick up these plants. They like to buy good, uniformly green leaved plants.
Vegetables:
Harvest of good quality cucumber started in early February on December planted crops. There were good production volumes in December and January from lighted crops. Tomato harvest started in March and good volumes are reported. Fruit from Mexico is still available in marketplace. Green peppers started to be harvested in March and now coloured peppers started in April.
A fruit problem was noticed with cucumbers where blossom end started turning soft and mushy. It was seen in cucumbers coming from Mexico as well. It appears that problem was related to the fact when 24 hours temperature is kept over 22-23C in order to fill the cucumbers faster and also over watering practices. Growers should take note of the fact that cucumbers require a growth balance between vegetative and generative, not that one stage should dominate over the other.
When generative growth dominates over vegetative, the fruit skin can become weaker especially the blossom end. When growers harvest mature fruit they should check out the maturity of fruit at the blossom end not just towards the stem end. Extreme temperature fluctuations during storage and transportation can also contribute towards this problem. |
|