Profitable perennials

Photo courtesy of Darwin Perennials and Kieft Seed

Greenhouse Management: How are perennials different from annuals?

Chris Fifo: Traditionally, perennials required a thorough cold treatment and dormancy period — a process known as vernalization — to reach maturity. During this process of dying back and going dormant during winter, newly propagated, immature perennials experience bio-chemical changes that enable plants to transition from juvenility to maturity, which triggers flowering. Some perennials will not flower without vernalization.

GM: What are the benefits of perennials to growers?

CF: Perennials can offer better margins and greater profitability. There’s less waste. Perennials that don’t sell can be held over to the following season. When planted into larger containers, they mature to be bigger and better.

Perennials extend the selling season. Early-season perennials, like Aquilegia and Iberis, can tolerate frost and be sold earlier than annuals. Late-season perennials, such as Echinacea and Caryopteris, tolerate heat and can be marketed with fall crops.

GM: Do consumers want perennials?

CF: Consumer demand for perennials has grown tremendously!

Perennials require less work from busy home gardeners because they don’t need to be planted every year.

Perennials help increase pollination rates of native bees and butterflies.

Consumers often augment their perennial beds with complementary annuals.

Modern breeding has brought many new, exciting perennials to market that offer eye-catching flower forms, colors and textures.

GM: What’s the difference between starting perennials from seed vs. vegetative cuttings?

CF: Timing is everything. Seed typically takes several more weeks than cuttings to make a finished container.

GM: How can I make growing perennials easier?

CF: Perennials can be grown in the same growing media with the same fertilizers and in the same greenhouses as annuals. Modern breeding has removed the requirement of cold treatment and dormancy. This allows more perennials to be scheduled for flowering and garden center traffic Darwin Perennials and Kieft Seed have done a tremendous amount of culture research documenting perennial scheduling and have brought this information together for growers via the First-Year-Flowering Tool. With the interactive First-Year-Flowering Tool, growers select from dozens of perennial varieties — from Aquilegia to Verbena — and enter the week that color is desired. Just by doing that, the First-Year-Flowering Tool computes your recommended sow week, plug-ready week and plug transplant week.

The First-Year-Flowering Tool makes scheduling and growing perennials easy and profitable.