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The Magic and Beauty of Farm Tours
This summer, Lisa is hosting an open garden and warehouse day on Saturday, June 24, 2023. If you have the opportunity to visit, it will be one of the best decisions you will ever make for yourself as both a gardener and a flower farmer. It’s magical and beautiful to watch growers and customers experience and interact with each other on flower farms. There’s a connection between people and nature that is unlike anything else.
I jump at every chance I get to visit a flower farm – or any kind of farm. If you only ever visit farms through social media, you’re not getting the whole story because it’s mostly a highlight reel for people’s lives and businesses. Visiting other flower farms shows me that no farm is perfect. I see the weeds. I see crop failures. I see the piles of junk that haven’t been taken to the trash yet. The magic and beauty in this is that these farms are successfully growing and profitably selling flowers, hosting workshops, and building a place within their community under imperfect conditions and with less than ideal buildings, systems, and life conditions. I’m reminded that I can be successful on my little farm, work with what I have, farm through failures, and keep dreaming of a better, more profitable future while learning from other growers.
Visiting other flower farms allows me to meet people and build a community with other flower farmers who have become friends and supported me. We’ve cheered each other on as well as lifted burned out, downtrodden spirits through the hard times. By signing up to take an on-farm workshop at another flower farm, I’m also supporting that farm financially. This is important because most successful flower farms have spent money and survived years of failures to build their farms into the profitable businesses they are today. I don’t ask them to give away their knowledge for free. If you support other farms by spending money with them I think you’ll find they are willing to help you along the way as you build your farm.
You may have heard that this year’s open farm event will be hosting TGW instructors Dave Dowling and Ellen Frost. We recently found out that Val Schirmer will be joining us as well! Val is the instructor of TGW’s on demand mini-workshop, Forcing Glorious Blooms for the Holidays and Beyond. She is also the current President of the ASCFG.
If you can’t join Lisa and her TGW crew for this year’s Open Farm event, there’s another great way for you to learn from other farmers. Lisa’s podcast, Field and Garden, periodically has episodes featuring replays of our popular Instagram show called “Ask A Flower Farmer,” where a flower farmer or TGW instructor takes questions and talks about their own farm and farming experiences. You’ll hear the humble beginnings all these hosts came from, as well as the valuable lessons learned on their farms.
Wendell Berry says, “People need to feed themselves, next they need to feed their own communities.” I know he’s talking about food. But when I read this I think about the feeding of our souls that comes from meeting each other face to face in nature in our community to learn from each other and support each other in the U.S. local grown flower movement sweeping the country.
Recent Field and Garden episodes featuring “Ask a Flower Farmer” replays:
#234 Amelia Ihlo, Rooted Farmers
#233 Ask a Florist with Ellen Frost
About The Author: Anne Morgan is our Customer Service Coordinator at The Gardener’s Workshop and the head grower at Franklin Flower Farm in Macon County, NC. Anne can be reached at [email protected].
