Borneo Bulletin Digital

Lifestyle

FRIDAY, APRIL 10, 2020

Gardening

Adrian Higgins

The Washington Post - The

best place to keep vegetable seed

packets is in the refrigerator, where

they arepreservedand storedaway

from rodents and insects. But this

habit comes at a price. I have sev-

eral dozen half-used packets in the

crisper, and there’s no place for the

salad greens.

Never mind, because this

spring my pack-rat nature is re-

warded. Buying fresh seed, while

not impossible, is more complicat-

ed this year because of the coro-

navirus emergency.

In sum, there is a rush on seed

buying as overnight homesteaders

are either seeing the value of grow-

ing their own food or feel they are

in a dystopia where their very ex-

istence depends on getting some

beans to germinate. Or both.

The owners of seed companies

I’ve talked to are a bit shellshocked

by the consumer frenzy, though

they admit there are worse prob-

lems to have. They anticipate de-

lays in filling online orders and the

sellout of some varieties, but no

across-the-board shortage. For

those venturing out, retail seed

racks may be depleted.

“It’s the largest volume of or-

ders we have seen,” said Jere Get-

tle of Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds

in Mansfield, Missouri. Peak seed-

buying season for home garden-

ers is January to March, but the

normal end-of-season decline in

orders isn’t happening.

Customers are gravitating to

vegetables high in nutrients, such

as kale, spinach and other quick-

to-grow leafy greens. “Spinach is

off the charts,” said Jo-Anne van

den Berg-Ohms of Kitchen Garden

Seeds in Bantam, Connecticut.

The other top seller is the

bean in all its forms. This is be-

cause beans are not only a healthy

source of protein, but are also easy

to grow and versatile. In the green

stage, the pods and seeds are

tasty. When left to ripen, the seeds

form beans that can be stored and

used for soups and casseroles.

Gettle said his company is

handling approximately 4,500 or-

ders daily, about twice the usual

peak demand of spring. Swamped,

he closed his website for three

days and stopped taking phone

orders to allow staff to catch up

John Raby

CHARLESTON, West Virginia (AP) —

Dig. Plant. Breathe.

As spring’s arrival in the Northern

Hemisphere coincides with govern-

ment stay-at-home orders, the itch

to get outside has turned backyard

gardens into a getaway for the mind

in chaotic times.

Gardenerswho already know that

working with soil is a way to connect

with nature say it helps take away

their worries, at least temporarily.

“I love to see things grow,” Lind-

say Waldrop said. “It’s incredibly

therapeutic.” Now more than ever.

Waldrop, a resident of Anaheim,

California, has an anxiety disorder.

Exercise is supposed to help, but

her new job as a college biology

professor had prevented her from

getting into a routine.

Her grandfather, who intro-

duced her to gardening by showing

her how to plant seeds, died about

a year ago.

Add the global coronavirus pan-

demic to all that, and it’s easy to see

where her focus is these days.

“Sometimes I just like to sit and

dig holes in the quiet with my own

thoughts,” she said. “Outside, it

takes my mind off. It gives some-

thing for my hands to do. It gives

you a separate problem to think

about than whatever else is going

on. It gets you off of social media.”

Waldrop and her husband

moved last summer from New Mex-

ico, where she didn’t have much

luck gardening in a scorching cli-

mate. At her new home, she got rid

Feed the soul: In chaotic times, gardening becomes therapy

of the lawn, installed an irrigation

system, and recently planted doz-

ens of tomatoes, eggplant, peppers

and other vegetables.

Over the years, Waldrop con-

verted her sceptical husband, who

initially wondered why digging in

the dirt and moving things around

was considered fun.

After tasting his first home-grown

tomatoes, he was converted.

Families, too, are discovering

that gardening gives cooped-up

kids something to do, builds their

self-esteem and brings variety to

what has suddenly become a lot of

time spent together.

In Miami, Annika Bolanos isn’t

a fan of the south Florida heat and

mosquitoes. But going outdoors

lately has been a lifeline. Bolanos

works at home making cakes and

doing bookkeeping with her hus-

band’s golf cart business.

Her three young children add

an extra layer of busy, and together

they’ve seeded a variety of vegeta-

bles and herbs.

“We have always loved the idea

of growing our own food,” Bolanos

said. “It feels good to eat something

that you grew yourself too. It also

helps my kids eat more fruits and

veggies since they find it cool to eat

what they have grown.”

Her children water the plants

daily and concentrate on what’s

growing. “You’re feeling the sun and

the breeze and don’t have to worry

about anything in the moment,” Bo-

lanos said. In Britain and Germany,

there’s a premium on allotments —

popular parcels of land rented for

growing food crops.

“Those with a garden are the

lucky ones,” said Heidi Schaletzky,

standing on the lawn beneath a

cherry tree in the north of Berlin.

Schaletzky and her husband

have been cultivating a plot in the

‘Free Country’ community garden

for the past eight years, growing

strawberries, salad greens and kohl-

rabi. So far, access to garden plots

remains exempt from restrictions

intended to stop the spread of the

virus in Germany.

“We’ll be able to see other peo-

ple, too,” she said. “As long as they

stay on their side of the fence.” As

the weather warms, garden shops

are bustling as other businesses

shut during the outbreak.

At the Almaden Valley Nursery

in San Jose, California, rose expert

John Harp has seen a mix of new

gardeners and regulars. Customers

can’t come into the shop, so their

online orders are brought to their

vehicles in the parking lot.

“Around town everyone is

gardening right now,” Harp said.

“They’re looking to be a little bit

more self-sufficient.” This home-

grown attitude goes back to World

War II, when millions of people

cultivated victory gardens to pro-

tect against potential food short-

ages while boosting patriotism

and morale.

Hollie Niblett, who lives near

Kansas City, Kansas, hopes the vic-

tory gardens come back. Niblett,

who has a degree in horticultural

therapy, tends to a kitchen garden

near her backdoor, perennial flow-

ers, flowering trees and shrubs, and

upper and lower grassy yards con-

nected by a path through an area

left in its natural condition.

“There are so many things about

it that feed my soul,″ she said. “Right

now, more than anything, my garden

gives me hope, gives me purpose

and provides a sense of connection

to something bigger than myself.”

For beginners, wonderment

awaits. Just southof Atlanta, 10-year-

old Ezra Gandy’s love for playing

baseball has been paused. He and

his grandmother, Melanie Nunnally,

recently started an outdoor garden,

planting strawberries, cabbage,

broccoli, kale and asparagus.

“I like digging in the dirt be-

cause I like to see all the bugs and

stuff that’s in the ground,” he said.

The nonprofit group KidsGarden-

ing.org

suggests that children grow

their own salads or do other activi-

ties. The virus scare could even ush-

er in a new crop of gardeners who

start from seed rather than risk the

crowds buying starter plants.

Kendra Schilling of Scott Depot,

West Virginia, doesn’t have space for a

sprawlinggarden, soshe’splantingpo-

tatoes in a bucket and trying to figure

out with her teenage daughter what to

do with other vegetable seeds.

FROM LEFT: Gail Henrickson and her daughter, Melissa, shop for plants at a local garden centre as they stay at home during the coronavirus outbreak in Richmond, Virginia; Old trousers recycled as growbags for herbs in an allotment as

people are flocking to find advice on growing their own fruit and vegetables in the light of the coronavirus crisis, in Bromley, Kent, England; and Stephanie Owens looks over the garden with her son, Cole, as they tend to it at their home.

PHOTOS: AP

An onslaught of orders engulfs seed

companies amid COVID-19 fears

with the backlog. He may have to

do so again if the volume persists,

he said.

His family-owned seed com-

pany is known for its unusual heir-

loom vegetable varieties and has

emphasised Asian vegetable vari-

eties in recent years. More than a

quarter of the offerings have been

sold out. “In some cases, we can

getmore seed” for the current sales

season, he said, “and in others, we

cannot.” Another challenge is the

ability to get fresh seed packets

printed as well as mailing supplies

- such things as bubble wrap - now

that the world has shifted to online

ordering and home delivery.

“We are definitely seeing an

increase in sales,” said Chief Ex-

ecutive and President of W Atlee

Burpee & Co in Warminster, Penn-

sylvania Jamie Mattikow. As with

other retail seed companies,

Burpee sells seed for herbs and

annual flowers in addition to veg-

etables. “Online we are getting

many more customers coming to

us, and interest is skewed toward

vegetables,” he said.

Van den Berg-Ohms, of Kitchen

Garden Seeds, said sales are up 40

per cent. “More people are plant-

ing more varieties,” she said. Vari-

eties of vegetables and herbs that

are directly sown into the garden,

as opposed to started indoors first,

“are really going crazy,” she said.

Sales were already up notice-

ably in January, she said, but in the

first week of March, “the incremen-

tal surge” started and has contin-

ued unabated.

The company, which special-

ises in gourmet varieties for home

cooks, is able to meet demand,

but some varieties may become

scarce or unavailable, she said. “At

this point, we are just keeping up

with it.”

Such sales increases historical-

ly follow recessions as people seek

to reduce grocery bills by growing

their own food - seed sales jumped

in 2009 after the Great Recession.

Sudden unemployment is part of

a new reality for millions of Ameri-

cans as communities and states

across the country have closed

down to check the contagion.

Renee’s Garden, a seed compa-

ny in Felton, California, also sells on-

line and through retail seed racks. Its

owner, Renee Shepherd, specialises

in varieties developed for novices,

the cook-gardener and urban dwell-

ers - many are designed for contain-

er growing. The normal spring peak

is around 350 orders daily; now, it’s

up to 2,000, she said.

“We are swamped. It’s taking

us four or five days” to fill orders,

she said. “And normally, we would

have more warehouse staff and

have double shifts, but because of

the (employee) safety measures,

we can only do what we can do.”

Seed companies obtain their

stock from a web of sources, in-

cluding seed distributors and bro-

kers and directly from contract

growers. The seed farmers might

be in a nearby field, the other side

of North America or somewhere

around the world, depending on

the variety. Shepherd offers almost

1,000 varieties of vegetable, herb

and flowers sourced from 50 com-

panies. “It’s more complicated for

a company like Renee’s, because

we get a lot of seed from Europe,”

she said.

Some suppliers have reserves

for immediate use, but some va-

rieties will need another growing

season to produce a harvest.

Shepherd has her own reserves

for sales later in the year to gar-

deners in mild regions who want

a second harvest in the fall. In the

current tidal wave of orders, she

now has to decide if she wants to

dip into those.

Mattikow said Burpee replen-

ishes stocks in retail seed racks,

which are found in such places as

hardware stores, garden centers

and grocery stores - businesses

generally exempt from closure or-

ders. For her rack sales, Shepherd

said, “the big question is what will

happen if they run out and we

haven’t a clue how many stores will

remain open by (April).”

Orders that may have taken a

week to arrive will take longer, in

part due to pressures on mail and

parcel carriers. “All of us are do-

ing the best we can to catch up,”

Shepherd said, “but people need

to be patient.”

Gardening tip

Emerging spring bulbs can be

cut to take indoors to enjoy. Wait

until flower buds show colour be-

fore cutting. Daffodils exude a sap

that might be a skin irritant - take

care to avoid contact. Change the

vase water every three days or

so, and re-snip stems to prolong

the display.

Sales of seed of lettuce and other leafy greens are brisk as consumers turn to growing their own food amid the

coronavirus emergency. PHOTO: THE WASHINGTON POST

Katherine Roth

AP - Traditionally, growing your own

herbs and veggies was reserved for

those with the luxury of outdoor

space and abundant light.

Now there are a number of new,

high-tech indoor gardening sys-

tems that allow apartment dwellers

with limited light, or those aching to

gardening before the season starts,

a chance to grow their own greens.

For many households sheltering

in place, with limited access to per-

ishable foods, the devices can also

provide a source of fresh herbs and

vegetables, as well as a chance to

enjoy growing something.

And novices needn’t worry:

These automated growing systems

are relatively foolproof, with pre-

planted “seed pods,” auto-timed

lights, even smartphone apps and

Alexa interfaces to help you through

the process.

“It’s sort of like the K-cup model

for growing,” explained Paul Ra-

baut, marketing director at AeroG-

arden, which makes a range of in-

door growing systems that use seed

pods, which are inserted into the

electronic growing machine, not

unlike inserting a capsule into a cof-

fee machine.

High-tech growing systems bring joy of gardening indoors

“Our mission is to allow peo-

ple access to freshly grown herbs

and veggies all year round, even

without a yard or much light. It’s

easy to be successful and there

are no messy bags of soil to lug,”

explained Rabaut.

Like a number of these systems,

AeroGarden uses hydroponics, a

method of growing that uses only

water and liquid nutrients, not the

soil used in traditional gardening.

Seeds come embedded in a plug of

peat, nestled inside a tidy capsule

pre-labelled with the name of the

plant, how tall it’s expected to grow

and in how many days.

All that’s required is to add water

and nutrients periodically, and the

rest is automated.

Indoor gardeners can ex-

pect their first harvest in a matter

of weeks.

After two or three months, the

seed pod needs to be replaced — or

planted in traditional soil to continue

growing — and another pod can be

inserted in the system. As with cof-

fee capsules, the plastic seed pods

are recyclable, Rabaut said, adding

that AeroGarden pod trays can be

swapped out for a seedling tray that

lets people start many more plants

at once.

Another popular growing sys-

tem is Click and Grow. And big

names like Samsung, LG and IKEA

have also worked on developing au-

tomated indoor growing systems.

“We have a new competitor

coming on the market every week

or two somewhere in the world,”

said Martin Laidla, public relations

manager for the Estonia-based Click

and Grow, whose biggest market is

North America.

“We call this ‘hyper-local garden-

ing’ since you can do the growing

right in your kitchen, but some sys-

tems are definitely better than oth-

ers. It’s easy to put together a plas-

tic base and light, but it’s the quality

of the growing medium and the

growing technology, and of course

the light, that’s really the trick,” said

Laidla. Marc Hachadourian, director

of glass house horticulture at the

New York Botanical Garden, said,

“Technology has invaded every as-

pect of our lives, so it was only amat-

ter of time until technology entered

into gardening.

“LED light technology was really

the game changer, with better qual-

ity plant lights available in all differ-

ent sizes,” he said.

“Now you can even buy tiny clip-

on plant lights for your African Vio-

let, or plant lights that are the size of

desk lamps. They used to be enor-

mous things.”

But just as coffee capsules aren’t

for everyone, neither are these

growing systems, which can seem

sterile to those used to gardening

the old-fashioned way.

“I’ve seen novices grow won-

derful plants using these systems,”

said Hachadourian. But he added,

“There’s still something for getting

your hands in the dirt. If you just

plug it in and watch it grow, there’s

no interaction there.”

He said that with good-quality

modern plant lights, people can also

grow plants in soil indoors without

a high-tech system, while getting

hands-on enjoyment. “It’s like cook-

ing. Sometimes it’s good to get your

hands dirty,” he said.

AeroGarden’s indoor growing systems, the AeroGarden Bounty Elite.

PHOTOS: AP

The AeroGarden Harvest 360