When I first came up with the name Plant Nappers as a business name, I thought it was original enough to get me noticed. It made me and many who heard it laugh as well. Unfortunately, I am finding out now that I am emersing myself in the horticultural world, not everyone has quite the same sense of humor as I do. Imagine that! Who would have thought that the name would be taken so literally. Umm, ok I did. That little giggle for me should have been a sign, but I overlooked it, or perhaps my blinders needed adjusting.
A few weekends ago, we had our first public sale of daffodils that had been rescued. It was recieved well and we made a few bucks. The unfortunate side of this is how many times I had to either 1) explain what a napper was, 2) explain that I did not steal the plants to resell them, or 3) what our intent was in starting the business. One of the three of those questions I was happy to explain at any time and in great detail. The other two became a bit annoying the longer the day went on. The first person who asked me, a neighbor, planted the seed in my head, and everytime someonelse asked the seed was fertilized and watered well.
A little time passed and another close friend, with deep roots in the botanical world, informed me that there are people out there that will consider you a thief if you pick a flower or a seed pod from their garden, even if they had no intent on propogating it themselves. He told me to be very weary of using my plant napper name in some of the horticultural circles. OK, now I have just composted the heck out of my seed growing like kudzu in my brain. I was not happy.
So what would be the next step in this story you might ask? You guessed it, come up with a new name, while retaining the identity of what I do, and what my target audience is. J and I kicked so many names back and forth, (I am not sure there were as many kicks in the world cup.) I kept hearing part of a comedians skit named Eddie Izzard talking about coming up with the name Inglebert Humperdink. If you don't know what I am referring to, look it up, He is halarious...(another clue to my sense of humor)
Back and forth we went, always trying different things, different languages etc.....JS told of us paridisio del sol was a play on Parkinsons name Paridisio meaning paradise or playground and del sol in the sun. Park-In-Sun= Parkinson. Trying to be as whitty as him caused me hours of trbulations.
Driving home after meeting many very prominant people in the Hort world, I knew then the name had to change. There is time for humor and I will find a place for it, but a company name is the first and perhaps the only chance you will have to get a new client. This is not the time to be offending someone or cause them to gather their plants like a mother hen heards her bitties to her when trouble shows its head.
I will unveil the new name over time, but it clearly identifies what we do, in a professional way. A way that doesn't cause me to blush, or studder over the name. I love the new name, but for those of you here from the begging I will still be the Plant Napper...MUwhahahha!
I will still include some whimsy and light heartedness to our plan, just not in a name.
Anyone got a guess as to what we will call it?
Whats in a name, a rose by any other name still smells as sweet.......ws
Monday, March 28, 2011
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Digging season is here...a confessional
Many of my friends sometimes find it hard to get in touch with me during the spring of the year. Don't they know that it is digging season? From early February to late May, I spend every minute I have going on drives looking for that house that is about to be destroyed to make way for the latest and greatest strip mall, gas station, subdivision, or new highway. Progress can be quite a pain, but for me, I look on it as an opportunity that would otherwise be missed.
Every evening and every morning as I drive to and from work my eyes are constantly scanning the roadsides for anything of color, or something rather dilapidated. The older the house and the worse condition it is in the better. Something will perk my interest then I will stop to investigate. First a leisurely walk around the site with camera or Ipod in hand. (a photo is a photo for documentation purposes) Sometimes I will walk the perimeter of a house and see nothing, other times, a gold mine! If there is a new plant, flower or the like I might take a cutting and some photographs of what and where, then back to the truck. If I deem the site a possibility its location get recorded with addresses and GPS coordinates in my handy dandy notebook! Everything I witnessed will be recorded in some fashion. If I believe the site to be in immanent danger I will immediately go knocking on neighbor doors. One thing I have been blessed with is a golden tongue when I need it. Turn on the charm and up on the doorstep I go. Many times I will walk away with either permission, stories about the old family that used to live there, or the current owners information. On the other hand though, If I deem the site safe and at little or no risk of danger it just gets recorded and on to the next one.
I have been amazed at the amount of flowers forgotten when the last family moved away and left neglected for the years. I would say that currently I have no fewer than 40 locations to be dug, some threatened, others not. If I was to dig each and every site, I would need a botanic garden to house it in to get the forgotten bulbs back on track with blooming cycles. Someone once told me that when some daffodils get left behind for so long they just forget that they are supposed to bloom. Getting them in the right locations and in the right soil can make the difference from blooming to BLOOMING!
I am always in a debate with myself, "Do I dig them now while access is good and before they get destroyed, or do I take a chance and wait till they die back and dig them then.?"It is always a tough call. Whatever I dig, if it is still green it goes either in a holding bed or in a pot. Unfortunately, I am running out of space for both.
Little did I know last spring that this would be so lucrative for me and so easy to find new things. Growing up, daffodils, or yellow jonquils as they were called (a misnomer) all looked exactly the same. they were yellow and grew everywhere, so why were they any good? Only after getting involved and getting to know the history of them did the yellow start dividing into an infinite shade of colors and cups. Like starting any sort of a collection, the more you look, do your research, and find, the more you understand. Although, I am at a point where the more I understand the more I realize how little I really know.
There are two quotes that I heard while keeping bees for a few years that can apply to daffodils and in general heirloom plants. The first is ( substitute beekeeper for flower nut) "You can have ten beekeepers in a room and get twelve opinions!" and finally I think perhaps Sue Hubbell said in her book, "I knew more about beekeeping the first year than any year after that. The more I learn the more the bees show me how little I really know" OH, how true that is to me.
Every evening and every morning as I drive to and from work my eyes are constantly scanning the roadsides for anything of color, or something rather dilapidated. The older the house and the worse condition it is in the better. Something will perk my interest then I will stop to investigate. First a leisurely walk around the site with camera or Ipod in hand. (a photo is a photo for documentation purposes) Sometimes I will walk the perimeter of a house and see nothing, other times, a gold mine! If there is a new plant, flower or the like I might take a cutting and some photographs of what and where, then back to the truck. If I deem the site a possibility its location get recorded with addresses and GPS coordinates in my handy dandy notebook! Everything I witnessed will be recorded in some fashion. If I believe the site to be in immanent danger I will immediately go knocking on neighbor doors. One thing I have been blessed with is a golden tongue when I need it. Turn on the charm and up on the doorstep I go. Many times I will walk away with either permission, stories about the old family that used to live there, or the current owners information. On the other hand though, If I deem the site safe and at little or no risk of danger it just gets recorded and on to the next one.
I have been amazed at the amount of flowers forgotten when the last family moved away and left neglected for the years. I would say that currently I have no fewer than 40 locations to be dug, some threatened, others not. If I was to dig each and every site, I would need a botanic garden to house it in to get the forgotten bulbs back on track with blooming cycles. Someone once told me that when some daffodils get left behind for so long they just forget that they are supposed to bloom. Getting them in the right locations and in the right soil can make the difference from blooming to BLOOMING!
I am always in a debate with myself, "Do I dig them now while access is good and before they get destroyed, or do I take a chance and wait till they die back and dig them then.?"It is always a tough call. Whatever I dig, if it is still green it goes either in a holding bed or in a pot. Unfortunately, I am running out of space for both.
Little did I know last spring that this would be so lucrative for me and so easy to find new things. Growing up, daffodils, or yellow jonquils as they were called (a misnomer) all looked exactly the same. they were yellow and grew everywhere, so why were they any good? Only after getting involved and getting to know the history of them did the yellow start dividing into an infinite shade of colors and cups. Like starting any sort of a collection, the more you look, do your research, and find, the more you understand. Although, I am at a point where the more I understand the more I realize how little I really know.
There are two quotes that I heard while keeping bees for a few years that can apply to daffodils and in general heirloom plants. The first is ( substitute beekeeper for flower nut) "You can have ten beekeepers in a room and get twelve opinions!" and finally I think perhaps Sue Hubbell said in her book, "I knew more about beekeeping the first year than any year after that. The more I learn the more the bees show me how little I really know" OH, how true that is to me.
Today is the first day of the rest of my life! Please read.
Bear with me as I learn the process of blogging. I have dabbled at similar ideas but have had this suggested to me as the best outlet for it. I will be discussing the process of building a starter plant business from the basement to the penthouse suite. Right now I think I am somehwere on the docks waiting to get in. :)
What is Plant Nappers?
I am trying to start a secondary business that hopefully will allow me to quit my regular job and do it full time. My interest started with a culmaniation of several hobbies but most importantly geneology. I had spent many years trying to find an old family plantation in Powhatan, Virginia. After several long, hot, exhausting hikes in tick and chiggar infested woods, with little or no success, I had all but given up. The land that contains the plantation is currently a hunt club. I happened upon one of them off site and we talked for a bit about its location. It was then that he dropped a bomb on me. He looked at me with a such matter of fact countenance and told me, "Just come in the spring when the daffodils are in bloom and you can't miss it!" Such a simple sentence but cut me to the quick.
Were my ancestors into gardening as well? What did the plantation look like with all of the flowers in bloom?
The following spring I went to Powhatan with my then new girlfriend "J" It was raining and cold, the type of cold that cut to the bone, but she was willing to go anyway. Trodding through mud down a long and rather dismal dirt path we made our way to where I thought the house should be. Crossing the creek I begain to have a glimmer of hope as the periwinkle was growing and blooming rather vigorously. As we approached the summit of the hill, our hopes were crystalized. There before us lay an area of better than 1 acre of nothing but trees and golden heads of thousands of pseudonarcissus blooms. I did't care that they were common, I didn't care that the rain had gone from a sprinkle to an all out down pour. The only thing going through my head at the time is "Eureka!"
J and I began to dig a few clumps of some that were in bloom but not fully opened yet to take home to the new home garden we had. I grabbed a clump for my mother who also loves all things blooming, and loaded them into my backpack to begin the walk out. Have you ever carried clumps of heavy waterlogged clay on your back? Uggh.......
It wasn't until after we got home and we had the clumps replanted that I felt safe in the fact they would live again. Some were in pots, some were bare bulbed and replanted in the yard around our first new tree, a native redbud. A few days passed and and the blooms had all but dried up to a shell of their previous beauty. Sad, but knowing that again next year and many years after that they would be back to bring a smile to my face and remind me of the place that my ancestors called home almost 300 years before, i went on with my garden projects. The pots that were sitting so patiently for me to come back to them had a suprise waiting for me. Poking up from one of them was a fading double with very distinct white and orange colors. I had missed it in its prime, but nonetheless it waited for me. I had never seen such a daffodil, and was unsure what it was. Sure I have crossed paths with butterand eggs(van sion?) many times in my life but never a wild found white double.
J and I decided that the next year we had to return to Powhatan to look for more. Waiting with baited anticipation, March finally came and it was time to revisit the homesite. Once again mother nature had a plan of her own and gave us a bit of rain that day, which made it almost feel like de ja vu. We made our way atop the hill again and once again the hill was covered with waning yellow cups as far as you could see through the woods. Jumping from clump to clump we looked carefully to see any unopened buds, or buds that appeared to be different. Our eyes were scanning the thousands of potential clumps looking for the elusive "Orange Phoenix"while hearing a rather juvenile song of "one of these is not like the others" in my head. Our time and efforts were not paying off. Our trip was fruitless until i heard from yards away J call out, "Honey, you might want to come over here!" It was in the subtleties of the inflection in her voifce that I knew she had found something worth looking at. I am not sure how far I jumped and how many unfortunate little lent lillies got crushed in my mad dash to her side. One day I will ask their forgiveness. There she was standing in a small group of many of the regular pseudo narcissus, but hiding scattered like easter eggs among them were little white doubles. The journey of many miles had paid off. We had our little elusive bulbs. I gathered them up carefully and put them back in my backpack. Weighted down we hiked back to the truck. Tired, wet, and filled with exhuberation we made our way back to our home in NC and quickly got them planted and in pots to await the next years bloom.
So you could say that Plant Nappers began with a single Orange Phoenix, and the rest of the story is soon to come.
What is Plant Nappers?
I am trying to start a secondary business that hopefully will allow me to quit my regular job and do it full time. My interest started with a culmaniation of several hobbies but most importantly geneology. I had spent many years trying to find an old family plantation in Powhatan, Virginia. After several long, hot, exhausting hikes in tick and chiggar infested woods, with little or no success, I had all but given up. The land that contains the plantation is currently a hunt club. I happened upon one of them off site and we talked for a bit about its location. It was then that he dropped a bomb on me. He looked at me with a such matter of fact countenance and told me, "Just come in the spring when the daffodils are in bloom and you can't miss it!" Such a simple sentence but cut me to the quick.
Were my ancestors into gardening as well? What did the plantation look like with all of the flowers in bloom?
The following spring I went to Powhatan with my then new girlfriend "J" It was raining and cold, the type of cold that cut to the bone, but she was willing to go anyway. Trodding through mud down a long and rather dismal dirt path we made our way to where I thought the house should be. Crossing the creek I begain to have a glimmer of hope as the periwinkle was growing and blooming rather vigorously. As we approached the summit of the hill, our hopes were crystalized. There before us lay an area of better than 1 acre of nothing but trees and golden heads of thousands of pseudonarcissus blooms. I did't care that they were common, I didn't care that the rain had gone from a sprinkle to an all out down pour. The only thing going through my head at the time is "Eureka!"
J and I began to dig a few clumps of some that were in bloom but not fully opened yet to take home to the new home garden we had. I grabbed a clump for my mother who also loves all things blooming, and loaded them into my backpack to begin the walk out. Have you ever carried clumps of heavy waterlogged clay on your back? Uggh.......
It wasn't until after we got home and we had the clumps replanted that I felt safe in the fact they would live again. Some were in pots, some were bare bulbed and replanted in the yard around our first new tree, a native redbud. A few days passed and and the blooms had all but dried up to a shell of their previous beauty. Sad, but knowing that again next year and many years after that they would be back to bring a smile to my face and remind me of the place that my ancestors called home almost 300 years before, i went on with my garden projects. The pots that were sitting so patiently for me to come back to them had a suprise waiting for me. Poking up from one of them was a fading double with very distinct white and orange colors. I had missed it in its prime, but nonetheless it waited for me. I had never seen such a daffodil, and was unsure what it was. Sure I have crossed paths with butterand eggs(van sion?) many times in my life but never a wild found white double.
J and I decided that the next year we had to return to Powhatan to look for more. Waiting with baited anticipation, March finally came and it was time to revisit the homesite. Once again mother nature had a plan of her own and gave us a bit of rain that day, which made it almost feel like de ja vu. We made our way atop the hill again and once again the hill was covered with waning yellow cups as far as you could see through the woods. Jumping from clump to clump we looked carefully to see any unopened buds, or buds that appeared to be different. Our eyes were scanning the thousands of potential clumps looking for the elusive "Orange Phoenix"while hearing a rather juvenile song of "one of these is not like the others" in my head. Our time and efforts were not paying off. Our trip was fruitless until i heard from yards away J call out, "Honey, you might want to come over here!" It was in the subtleties of the inflection in her voifce that I knew she had found something worth looking at. I am not sure how far I jumped and how many unfortunate little lent lillies got crushed in my mad dash to her side. One day I will ask their forgiveness. There she was standing in a small group of many of the regular pseudo narcissus, but hiding scattered like easter eggs among them were little white doubles. The journey of many miles had paid off. We had our little elusive bulbs. I gathered them up carefully and put them back in my backpack. Weighted down we hiked back to the truck. Tired, wet, and filled with exhuberation we made our way back to our home in NC and quickly got them planted and in pots to await the next years bloom.
So you could say that Plant Nappers began with a single Orange Phoenix, and the rest of the story is soon to come.
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