New LED lights

Traditionally at this time of year the nursery is focused on cleaning liners ready for spring dispatch and catching up with maintenance around the nursery. One department that is usually very quiet is propagation as we stop production after week 30. This winter in order to increase Agapanthus production, improve quality and make better use of winter labour we have installed LED lights into one of our propagation greenhouses.

Initial results of tissue culture plants weaned from the laboratory in week 40 are very encouraging with plants establishing very evenly under lights that extend the day to 14 hours with 50umol of light intensity. This will enable us to produce one or 2 more crops from the same space during the year. Plants receiving less intense lighting on adjacent beds are also responding so we are experimenting with different light intensities.

The pink glow from the glasshouses attracted the attention of a neighbour who questioned whether we had gone into marijuana production- the answer was no, but then it might be more profitable than growing garden plants!