Setting up your own mini-nursery

[Stonehenge]

For the last couple years I've been half-heartedly looking for some land. The goal being to have several acres (4-10) on which we'll build a small pole building to house equipment/work on eqpt, have a little display area (actually about 1/2 acre of display) to have little vignettes, and last but not least to have some plant inventory.

The last one is the one I'm not so sure about how to go about doing...

I'm not looking to do any propagation, or if I am, it will be on such a small scale that one folding table could hold all the eqpt supplies. I'm thinking more of having a place where I can order bulk plant material and inventory it until I need it. 1.5-3" B&B trees held up with mulch piles, small irrigation system, maybe a shade house.

Do any of you have a similar setup? Bexter, you must. For those that do, what should a small guy like me look to do, and what things should I avoid?

Thanks in advance!

[Bexter]

Jeff ,

What we have is probably about 1 acre that holds all our caliper trees (90% from our own tree farm)... we dig holes (most are already dug, but need cleaning out yearly) ..set the trees in and cover them with mulch. This area has irrigation lines set on top of the ground with spaghetti lines to each tree.
We don't grow any of our own shrubs ... we have another area closer to the shop(also irrigated) that is a holding area ... a shrub order is sent in every thurs/fri., for delivery the following week. It is then sorted into individual orders ... taped off with the customer’s name.
The greenhouse is another story ...they bring in massive amounts at a time. Needless to say, if we are short something we can always buy from them.

[Stonehenge]

A local nursery here has pre-dug holes for trees as well, they use a poly liner, sort of like a pot, but without a bottom. Do your holes go right up to the root crown? The thing I find with this nursery is by mid-late season, the trees that have been B&B in those holes have some of the B rotted away, making pulling the tree out (w/o damage) difficult. Especially if they've begun rooting. They also use the spaghetti irrigation.

Another outfit created a massive bed of 3/4" clear limestone, about a foot deep, and places trees atop that, then mulches them in. Overhead irrigation.

Do you guys buy from all over, or do you stick to local growers?

[Bexter]

Almost all our caliper trees are in wire baskets and buried almost up to the crown.... Even with the wire cages if they were not tied up properly some will break loose...causing damage. You can tell the baskets that were tied up at the end of the day! Doesn't happen that often but occasionally. Most of the trees are sold before fall, when we will do another harvest for our needs that fall.

Almost all our shrubs come from one grower from BC, who supplies us with an excellent product, price and great service.

PS The mulch we use to cover the trees is not the same that we use on our Landscapes ...we use chips that are supplied from 2 or 3 tree pruning outfits that dump at our yard free of charge.

[PSUscaper]

I'm been thinking about the 'nursery' idea myself

I'm not sure if I'm thinking nursery though, more or less a 'stockpile' of plant material to be used throughout the year.

Basically, I use the same plant material on most jobs. Such things as 2-3 gal size shrubs, B&B stuff, 2.5" cal. trees, etc. etc.

The cost savings over buying at the local nurseries could be very signifigant........at least 50%, even more.

I have a friend who has a small nursery that lets me buy from him.
He basically has a 200' x 30' ft area that he keeps stocked throughout the year.

He sells everything for a price below what local nurseries do. Not a incredible savings, but a decent savings. Its funny, because I know where he gets it from and know what he's paying for it.....so we hassle over price quite often....

My idea is to do the same and cut everyone else out of the picture. . Stock stuff that I know I'll use, and maybe bring in a few unusual items to add a little variety. Dealing with the growers is very easy, and for a 5 hour trip in a truck, even a small order can be worth the savings.....many of the growers I have will fill small orders.

I'm thinking about just fencing in a area (a lot of deer around here), install a basic sprinkler system (rotor heads on top of posts), and filling it up with plants.

I'm trying to figure out the cost advantage. I figure that I'm going to lose some of the material, that some of it is not going to be used and sit all winter (then die....), and that some of it will not be able to be used.

I'm not sure how much money I am willing to shell out initially either........It takes a good hunk of money in the beginning of the season to buy all the material.........and in the beginning of the year that kind of money isn't necessarily available, so deciding how much to bring in has to be figured.

I've got good growers to buy from. Takes about a half day to go out, load up, and head back. For larger orders (like jobs that need 200 junipers or what not), I figure it is just as easy to go get what I need when I need it. I just want to have a stockpile for all those smaller jobs where you need 10 of these, 3 of those, 1 of these, etc. etc.....

Also, I have a few other contractors who would be interested in buying from me, so that may make it less of a economic burden on myself. Maybe by selling a few plants here and there, I can cover my overhead at least.

steve

[Stonehenge]

That sounds really close to what I want to do. I'm also thinking of a small retention pond, and a small hoop house for more delicate or shade-loving material. But nothing fancy - just something to stockpile for our typical stuff, for our $5-10K residential projects that it's a pain running/calling around tracking down good material, and for the cool perennials that get sold out so quickly in the spring.

The propagation thing will probably be just me playing Dr. Frankenstein :frank: for a little fun, in my spare time. :wacko:

[PSUscaper]

I like the idea of doing a little growing myself. Nothing fancy, but just giving it a shot.

I just talked to another friend who set up about 600 2 gal perennials last fall.....said it probably cost about 1-1.50 each between the pot, the liner, the labor, and the greenhouse fee. I'm interested to see how they turn out for him.

Since deer are a major, major problem around here, we really are becoming limited to what we can plant. That's why I like the idea of having a stockpile. Just bring in stuff deer don't eat and stick with it. I love korean boxwoods and can save a fortune buying them direct rather than a nursery. I mainly want to stock high cost items such as that.

Also, I feel it will give me a slight edge........I can get the material cheaper by stocking it and therefore can have a little more flexibility in my pricing........for example, while other contractors are installing 18-24"" boxwoods, I could be installing 24-30", making more money than they are buying 'nursery prices', and have jobs that look that much better with larger materials.

I love the look of larger material, but get hammered on the price at the local sellers. By going direct, setting up a pool to pull from, I feel I could 'set my self' apart from the rest.

steve

[diginahole]

Carrying inventory has never looked that attractive to me. The added burden of a perishable inventory even less attractive. So far I haven't had to deal with the problem of too much time on my hands, so growing or maintaining nursery stock is not something I see myself doing in the near future.

I do intend to have the business own property, but I have mainly considered it as a retirement investment. I have seen a lot of the old-timers around here make out quite nicely from the sale of the business property after retirement. Real estate is the only guaranteed safe investment that I know of.

A nice office/ shop and a marketing display are the main things I would use my property for. I'll keep the hobbies at home.

[Stonehenge]

I want those, too!! :D

The time on my hands thing was a bit tongue in cheek. I'm either working on this site or working on the biz (or both). Those are the 2 ingredients to my life at the moment...

And speaking of saving $$ - I'd like to have a couple mulch bins - if I can order by the semi I can get it for $6-8/yd, versus the $18-22 I'm paying now.

I foresee approx. 1/2 acre for displays - vignettes of different styles to see what grabs a client's eye. I very nice but very small front office whose purpose is to house clients for a few hours while we chat and present a design - I'd like a special AV room for that. :cool2: Then some back 'office' space, with a shower, lockers, that kind of stuff. The an attached or detached building for tools and eqpt, and enough room to pull a couple trucks or trailers in when in need of repair.

[Lawngodfather]

Yes bulk mulch is a hellava lot cheaper.

I have about 1 acre of some evergreens planted that we got for a real good price, many have died (no Irr), but they all needed to be BB for the last 2 years and finding the time to do this is non exsistant. We have all the supplies too.

Last fall they were scheduled by another growe/nusery (I sub install for them) to BB everything.

This is what I learned for pricing the grown stock.

takes 3 years, so you plant 1/3 one year, another 1/3 the next, and the last 1/3 the next. This way you are pulling stock every year, and it just keeps rotataing.

My buddy said he wholesales them to himself, then resells them at the premium price installed. He does sell to his son who opened a retail nursery.

He said it's about $4-$6 labor and materials per a plant for the 3 year span.

So next time you go buy that $40 plant, just think of how much is pure profit.