Come, Walk With Me
by
Carmen Cosentino

After a lifetime in the flower business, one might think that I have seen it all. Not
even close! Occasionally I find it necessary to visit some floral operations in the
country of Colombia. That nation has become one of the most important
suppliers of fresh cut flowers to the U.S. We import about 1 million roses from
there . . . every day. Carnations? How about a little more than 2 million a day.
We also bring in tons of pompom mums, baby’s breath, gerberas and
alstroemeria. We sure do use a lot of flowers. Just as with other industries, we
are losing our production greenhouses to foreign countries; have been for about
20 years. Labor, land costs, government restrictions, fuel and a whole lot of
other things are causing the move. Let us look at one of these greenhouse
operations. They’re a whole lot different.
To begin with, new greenhouses and expansions are done in blocks of 10
hectares, about 24 acres at a time. All are quite high tech and all still do a lot of
hand work that could be done by machine: more about that in a moment. And
greenhouses are built at different altitudes in the mountainous Andes.
Carnations and baby’s breath are planted at about 9000 feet because the
constant temperature is about 60 degrees day and night and all year round.
2000 feet lower is wonderful for pompom mums, statice and alstroemeria. We
will see roses at about 3 to 4 thousand feet. It is more tropical; we are just a
couple of hundred miles from the equator. Roses thrive at the constant
temperature of about 75 degrees and the humidity that we find here.
Jose Maria “Pepe” de LaTorre greeted us at his office on our arrival and spent a
half hour explaining his operation. He was operating about acres of greenhouse
and grew a wide range of flowers. Carnations and mums were the backbone of
his operations. He used to grow a lot of roses, but an area in Ecuador had a
micro-climate that really suited that plant, so he was phasing out of it, He also
grows Alstroemeria and statice and miniature carnations. Now for the tour.
He was really proud of his lab. It was magnificent. Up to date, fully equipped
and 2 scientists were at work with any number of technicians. They were testing
soil nutrients, water quality and keeping track of weather predictions. One large
part of the lab was dedicated to tissue culture; cloning of plants.
As we left the lab and headed toward the first greenhouse we saw piles of
ground lava and soil and men were shoveling it through large panels of ¼’
screens. Couldn’t it be done by machine? Yes, but there is a “no multiple layoff
rule” in Colombia. Laying off more than 3 people in a certain period of time
requires applications to the department of labor and may take weeks. So they
keep people busy, when necessary, doing menial tasks such as this.
Sanitation is all important here, so as you walk into or out of any of his
greenhouses you walk through a foot bath; diluted formaldehyde, so you won’t
carry any pathogens in. Two ladies in our group quickly found out that nylons
and formaldehyde do not mix; the stockings disintegrated. Our very first look
was carnations. The house was about a hundred feet wide and perhaps 250 feet
long. It was filled with carnations in all stages of growth.