Summer's here, so keep your shirt on

As a teenager, I always looked forward to June, when I could finally escape the classroom and enjoy the freedom of the hayfield and potato patch.

One of my first rituals would be to remove my shirt and work with my back bared to the sun. It would remain bared on any sunny day for the rest of the summer. After a few initial burns, my skin above the belt would soon turn to a deep tan. It seemed to be a great andhealthy way to enjoy the outdoors - at the time.

Pretty dumb, actually! Evidence is mounting that extensive, unprotected exposure to the sun's ultraviolet (UV) rays, particularly if severe sunburns result, can significantly increase the risks of serious medical problems decades down the road, including skin cancer, eye cataracts and damage to the immune system.

Of course, not all of the sun's ultraviolet energy is hazardous. In fact, the ultraviolet rays with the longest wavelength, called UV-A, are quite beneficial to living organisms. On the other hand, the shortest UV rays - UV-C - are very lethal and would destroy most life forms on earth if they reached the surface. In between are the UV-B rays, which cause sunburns, bleach clothing and paint, and deteriorate plastics and other materials.

High UV-B exposure can also reduce yields of some crop types, decrease productivity of aquatic plants, and harm marine life such as fish larvae and frogs.

Fortunately, the protective shield of ozone (an unstable form of oxygen that has three atoms rather than the conventional two) located some 15 to 40 kms above the earth's surface acts as a filter to incoming solar radiation, absorbing all of the UV-C and most of the UV-B radiation while allowing through the harmless UV-A and visible light. Despite this filter, however, 30 per cent of the UV-B still make their way through.

The amount of UV-B penetrating the atmosphere depends on three factors. The first is the intensity of the sunshine: Spring and summer seasons have more intense solar - and UV-B - radiation than falls and winters, and low latitudes more than high latitudes. The second factor is cloud, dust and humidity within the lower atmosphere. On a cloudy day, for example, the amount of UV-B (and the likelihood of sunburn) is a small fraction of that on a sunny day. The third factor is the thickness of the ozone layer above us, and its ability to absorb UV radiation.

Measurements of the amount of ozone in the atmosphere have been recorded at various stations around the world for several decades (using a Canadian-designed instrument, no less). Data show that the ozone layer has been slowly thinning during the past 20 years. While less well known than the more dramatic formation of the "ozone hole" over Antarctica each year, this thinning is potentially more serious: It is occurring over regions with greater abundance of vegetation and human populations. Scientific studies indicate that each percentage point decline in atmospheric ozone can increase the penetration of UV-B radiation by two per cent and the risk of skin cancer by about four per cent. Ozone concentrations over Toronto have already dropped by more than eight per cent since 1980.

Ozone depletion in the upper atmosphere is caused by chlorine and bromine released by chemicals such as CFCs, halons and methyl bromide. These chemicals are emitted by industrial processes at the surface and remain in the atmosphere until they make their way to the upper atmosphere, where they break down under intense sunlight.

The freed chlorine and bromine atoms then ravenously attack the ozone molecules, each atom destroying as many as 100,000 ozone molecules before finally being absorbed into a more stable chemical compound. International treaties have now banned the production of most CFCs and are reducing the use of other ozone-depleting substances, but the volume of chemicals already released will continue to work magic for years. Hence, while the loading of chlorine in the atmosphere now appears to have peaked, the decline in the ozone layer may continue for a number of years - and restoration will still take many decades.

In the meantime, protection against excessive UV-B exposure seems to be prudent. Environment Canada issues daily UV-B index forecasts with its weather forecasts to help warn of sunburn risks. The index uses a scale of 0 (no risk) to 10 (extreme risk). While these forecasts provide appropriate warning for sunbathers heading for the beach, they are also of importance to the farmer working his field - and to his young helpers just getting out of school.
Henry Henegveld is science adviser on climate change, Environment Canada

© copyright 1999 Agricultural Publishing Company Limited.


back

Pick-your-own places flowering

The bloom's on for two outfits that combine landscaping and grow-for-picking businesses

By Christina Selby

The next time you're driving the concessions and pass a pretty patch of flowers, check the signs. You may be able to drop in and pick a bunch.

Pick-your-own berries have been around for years; more recently, growers are extending the practice to vegetables, including peppers. Katie Dawson, Glencairn, Simcoe county, and Miriam Goldberger, Schomberg, York county, have created patches of paradise for people to drift through and pluck blooms at will. But the picking field is the fantasy side of the business - the reality is that the lion's share of income from these enterprises comes from plant sales and landscaping.

Dawson's husband, Chris Martin, started a landscaping operation in the Simcoe county area 11 years ago, a career choice that began with summers spent on a Saskatchewan farm as a teenager, leading to work as a groundskeeper at a Toronto cemetery and training in landscape at Humber College.

But Dawson, who studied horticulture at the University of Bath in England, always wanted to grow flowers. What started out six years ago as a few plants to be turned into dried arrangements became three acres of greenhouses, planted-out annuals for picking, plus perennial, herb and display beds when Dawson first opened to the public in 1996. Miriam Goldberger, formerly a publicist and editor, got into the flower business on a part-time basis about 11 years ago. She's been full-time for seven years now, and her husband, Paul Jenkins, left the advertising game a few years ago to manage the landscaping side of the business. Goldberger's and Jenkins' operation, Wildflower Farm, lives up to its name.

They specialize in wildflowers and offer seeds, seedlings, pick-your-own and dried flowers. The landscaping side provides clients - including corporations and municipalities - with wildflower gardens and meadows. The Wildflower Farm pick-your-own field contains more than 100 varieties of perennial flowers and native grasses, plus 50 varieties of annuals. Each morning, Goldberger puts together a bouquet to let visitors know what's available for picking. There's also the dried flower barn, a boutique of flower- and herb-related items, plus plants for sale.

For additional plant requirements, Wildflower is the Canadian rep for Prairie Nursery, a catalogue wildflower business based in Wisconsin. The catalogue - selling books and varieties of flowers and grasses - comes with Canadian pricing, but orders are filled in the U.S. Goldberger and Jenkins say they are trying to create a "country experience" and have installed picnic tables and a child's play area and tree house to encourage people to come out for the day. With the occasional bus tour, plus garden groups, Goldberger estimates between 3,000 and 5,000 visitors a year pay the $2 admission.

Dawson is also trying to encourage day visitors at Cut and Dried Flower Farm. Before letting visitors loose in the picking beds, she distributes buckets, pruners and instructions on the correct way to harvest - leaving the side branches and not cutting a stem that's too long: "I reserve the right to charge extra if the whole plant is taken."

She estimates about 16,000 annuals are planted out in late May in the front field. The number of varieties - currently about 60 - grows each year as Dawson is always on the lookout for new varieties: "Anything that looks like it'll be a good cut flower, I'll try." A central walkway runs across five-foot-wide beds divided by four-foot-wide grass pads - "wide enough for a ride-on mower to go down." The beds are covered with a polypropylene woven fabric that keeps down the weeds and retains moisture. They started out using plastic, but it lasted only one season, says Dawson, "and I hated having to dispose of it."

The fabric, which cost about $1,000 for the front field, is taken up every fall. In the spring, the beds are rototilled, a slow-release granular fertilizer is applied, and the fabric goes on top. Dawson says the fabric is looking good in its third season and she expects it will last two more. Time saved by not having to weed goes into the other priorities Dawson juggles. Her nine-month-old daughter, Rosalyn, has been spending quite of bit of time on Dawson's hip during the busy spring season.

Rosalyn stays with her grandmother mornings while Dawson takes care of her other job at Complete Outdoor Services, her husband's landscaping business. With two other workers, Dawson maintains about 20 area "country places," owned mainly by weekenders. "A lot of our clients don't have the time to do the weeding and pruning," she says. "The two businesses really compliment each other. If I need to do a planting, I can just take them from here."

Goldberger estimates Wildflower Farm will do 20 to 35 landscaping jobs for residential, resort, government and corporate sites this year all over southern Ontario, "from Meaford all the way to Omemee and from Collingwood down to Niagara."

The key to putting in wildflowers and native grasses is site selection, says Goldberger. Since the philosophy behind the plants is to grow them in their natural environment, matching plants to soil type is the first step.

"You just go with what works and what would be successful there," rather than amending the soil to meet plant requirements, she says. On display at the farm are a sand garden, a moist meadow, and a plot of plants that thrive in clay.

Site prep is the next step. Goldberger has a "do it once, do it right" philosophy. The most natural approach to putting in new growth is burning down the old, she says. "It warms up the soil and creates additional nutrients," but isn't always ideal.

The other option is a weed-eradication program. "Initially, you get rid of all competing plant material," she says. A site would need to be sprayed three or four times over a season to hit all emerging weeds. Once the site is clear, Goldberger recommends a fall seeding.

Wildflowers are a low-maintenance, low-cost alternative to formal flowerbeds, she says, citing the case of a Toronto-area Ford plant that was spending $30,000 a year to maintain and replant gardens on the grounds. Jenkins installed a mature wildflower garden: "All that needs to be done is mow it down in the spring and rake it up. They don't need fertilizer, they don't need extra water," says Goldberger.

While the pick-your-own aspect of the business brings in the customers, the majority of income is from landscaping and plant sales, says Goldberger. Dawson estimates Cut and Dried's income as 75 per cent plant sales, 20 per cent dried flowers and five per cent pick-your-own.

"I sell more in May with the bedding plants than the rest of the year with the cut flowers," says Dawson. She acknowledges that, like any new idea, widespread public acceptance of pick-your-own flowers will take a while. "We realize it's probably a 10-year proposition." Her priority is providing a quality product. "That's what brings people back," she says.

© copyright 1999 Agricultural Publishing Company Limited.


back

Eyes for irises

BY CHRISTINA SELBY

The show won't be around for long - mid to late June at the latest - but it's worth the trip to McMillen's Iris Garden just west of Norwich in Oxford county. With 20 acres and 1,500 varieties of irises, the fields are technicolour candy for the eyes.

Gloria McMillen started out in dairy many years ago, with irises as a sideline, but eventually it came down to a choice 25 years ago and the flowers won. "We started realizing how many varieties were out there," she says, and the collection has been expanding ever since.

So how many types are there? Well, miniatures start blooming at the end of April, followed by standards, intermediates and the star of the show, the tall beardeds. There are also Siberians, which seem to bloom first, says Gloria, and Japanese irises, also known as spireas, which will extend the bloom season beyond June.

What colours do they come in? "Every colour in the rainbow," says Gloria, except red. Currently there is no red pigment in an iris variety, but researchers are trying to find a way, she says.

Gloria estimates there are 500,000 hybrid names registered through the American Iris Society, which is iris central for the world. More are registered every year, and McMillen and her son, Dan, are always on the lookout for new ones.

Entrance to the garden is free, and plants are available for purchase. Irises are laid out in alphabetical order, says Gloria, so visitors can wander up and down the rows with catalogue in hand.

Dan McMillen rotates the beds every four or five years, "just to give them a rest," he says. He plants rye, plows it down, sprays with Roundup, then works it in. A granular fertilizer goes in before the next irises. He emphasizes that this approach is necessary only because the land has been in irises for 25 years and the soil needs to be rejuvenated. Such efforts are not required for irises in the garden. "We don't irrigate at all," says Dan. Too much water will cause irises to rot.

Dan uses a pre-emergent spray on the iris fields and rototills the strips in between to keep the weeds down. Irises grow well in most types of well-drained soil, he says, except for anything that's too rich. Gloria estimates retail sales at 4,000 to 5,000 a year; their website brings in orders from all over North America. Wholesale numbers are about 10,000.

Their other flower crops are day lilies and hostas, quite common choices for iris growers, as the three provide blooms over the season into the fall, says Gloria. The farm currently has about 30 varieties of hostas.

Iris plant varieties range in price from $3.50 for the more common varieties to $30 for recently registered hybrids, with most falling into the $6 range.

Orders for plants are taken up until September when the plants get shipped out, says Gloria.

For more information, or to get a catalogue: McMillen's Iris Farm, RR1, Norwich, ON N0J 1P0. (519) 468-6508. www.execulink.com/~iris

© copyright 1999 Agricultural Publishing Company Limited.


back