Ever Spring Orchids

Toured the Ever Spring Orchid nursery for an hour or so yesterday. What a tight ship it must be to have orchids blooming year round in Manitoba. Everything seemed to be very controlled. The lighting was provided by 500w compact florescent bulbs. The walls and ceiling were decked out in flat white; no doubt to provide excellent reflection for the artificial light.

The floors under the tables were open dirt with greenery and very damp soil. There were fogging fans keeping the humidity high and the I'm sure the temperature was controlled carefully too.

Somewhere along my travels I had heard a story about how this place came to be. In short, an Asian family, dominant in the production of orchids in Asia, deemed Winnipeg to be desirably central to North American markets and sent a son to begin a business here breeding and selling orchids in this part of the world.

The nursery appears modest on one hand, but we only saw a small portion of the operation. I would have liked to have toured the entire facility. Apparently it takes them about 18 months to produce a flowering plant from seed. The fellow there suggested it would take about twice that time in Canada and that all their stock comes from Asia in juvenile form and is finished here for sale.

The full set of images is posted on my Flickr account:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/clocker/sets/72157624160822878/