Planting and crop management for cut flowers
Case 1 A flush for Valentine’s Day - 1
Start from the Crop Selection button Tap Crop Selection for questions such as a planting and harvest calendar, varieties for your market and harvest window, or crops that fit a plot’s soil, water and climate. For pruning and fruit set, type your question. For cut flowers In roses, much of crop management is timing. Give ORTH the market date and when the flowers have to be packed, and it works back to the pinch. - 2
Ask when to pinch We asked when to pinch so the flowers are cut and packed by 1 February for Valentine’s Day. ORTH used 85 days from pinch to harvest as the working estimate and protected the plan against 80 to 90 days. At 90 days the pinch was due on 3 November. On 5 November it advised pinching all the ready shoots that same day and tagging them as a separate group. A 5 November pinch reaches harvest on 24 January, 29 January or 3 February at 80, 85 or 90 days, so only the slow case misses the deadline, by two days. Waiting until 8 November meets the date only at 85 days or faster; at 90 days those stems would arrive around 6 February. Do not pinch shoots that are not ready just to meet the calendar. - 3
Steer the flush Check the tagged shoots every week, and twice a week once buds show, and record shoot length, bud stage and uniformity. If the flush runs early, use less night heating and ventilate earlier in warm spells, avoid extra nitrogen and very wet beds, do not start with heavy shade, and cut at the buyer’s stage into the cold chain instead of holding flowers on the plant. If it runs late, raise the 24-hour mean temperature gradually with heat at night and before dawn and ventilation to remove moisture, let in as much light as possible, and keep moisture and EC steady. Once colour shows, a late flush cannot safely win back several days, so pack the most advanced export stems first. Case 2 When a plot needs renewal - 4
Ask how to judge renewal We asked how to judge whether Lote 1, planted in June 2021, is due for renewal or a change of variety. ORTH said not to renew on age alone: the plot is old enough for a formal review, but the decision rests on marketable stems, basal renewal, crown and root health, export packout, cost and buyer demand. Keep Freedom while those hold. Rehabilitate first when the decline is local and has a cause you can fix. Renew with Freedom when the market still wants it but the plants keep declining, and change variety only when another one proves better under the same conditions. When the decline is uneven, replace the weakest beds first, and do not decide on one poor flush. - 5
Keep a scorecard per flush ORTH asked to use the same bed or sector codes from crop to packing and to record every flush: marketable, downgraded and rejected stems per square metre and per surviving plant, grades and stem quality, vigorous and weak basal breaks, gaps, crowns and roots, cycle timing, pests and diseases, post-harvest results, cost per marketable stem and contribution per square metre. Count vigorous basal breaks apart from weak shoots, because old wood can keep stem numbers up while renewal declines, and judge the plot on its marketable stems. Start now with a fixed bed map of live, weak and missing plants.
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