Apr 16, 2015

Day Five Recap: 2015 California Spring Trials By Jasmina Dolce

We’ve reached the home stretch, only one more day and two more stops to go! Day 5 began in Ventura where we explored the Ventura Botanical Gardens. EuroAmerican Propagators and Suntory set up beautiful displays of their new and best varieties, and they did an awesome job showing how their products could be merchandised at retail.

Lots of cool concepts, incuding using wine bottles as containers for your plants! One of the most interesting parts of their display was the path where they showcased “365 days of color.” They put together plants by seasonal performance to show growers which items could be timed together.

Our second and final stop was at Ball Horticultral Co. in Santa Paula, where we got to check out the many selections offered by PanAmerican Seed, Kieft Seed, Ball FloraPlant, Selecta, Burpee, Darwin Perennials, Ball Ornamentals and Ball Ingenuity. I enjoyed the different messages displayed through the gardens and greenhouse.

One theme in particular, “Gateway to Gardening,” showed plants, such as Bandera lavender and Revolution gerbera, that are easier to grow for beginners. They work well as outdoor or indoor plants and can even be great gifts items. I think this type of message could help build up our industry and get more “brown thumbed” consumers involved in gardening.

Another new concept Ball introduced is “Real Series,” which is a designation they will give to certain collections of plants that can be shipped the same week, have the same culture and feature uniformity in habit. This well help growers select crops and time their shipping more efficiently.

Our Spring Trials tour is almost over, we only have one more day left! You can check out some of the highlights from Day 5 below, but be sure to go to our gallery page on www.californiaspringtrials.com to see even more pictures from our trip.

Bidens BeeDance series (Suntory)

This new series of bidens has two unique colors, ‘BeeDance Red Stripe’ and ‘BeeDance Painted Red’. They look awesome in combinations and are fairly compact for a novelty bidens. We also loved the cute tag that went along with the series, made it pop even more!

Petunia ‘Surfinia Summer Double Salmon’ (Suntory)

The Summer Double series is already a big hit for Suntory, but they’ve added a new salmon color to the lineup. It has the same floriferous, mounding habit as Pink, Rose and White (which do very well together in combinations), but Salmon flowers a bit earlier.

Ocimum ‘Balsamic Blooms’ (EuroAmerican Propagators)

This exciting new basil is just as much ornamental as it is edible. It grows leaves and blooms simultaneously and can be used in both the landscape and containers.

Tagetes ‘Gold Medal’ (EuroAmerican Propagators)

‘Gold Medal’ was actually introduced in 2013, but it’s being revived this year. As low water use is becoming more of a focus, this crop is being promoted more heavily due to its drought tolerance. Plus it really is a full flowering show stopper.

Dianthus Jolt series (PanAmerican Seed)

This new interspecific dianthus series is bred for heat tolerance. It survives the southern summer and doesn’t set seed. It pops with color and looks outstanding in the landscape. Two colors are currently available: Cherry (pictured) and Pink.

Petunia ‘Night Sky’ (Selecta)

We’ve been hearing a lot of buzz up the coast about this unique variety, so it was great to finally see it for ourselves. ‘Night Sky’ really does look like a starlit sky; the color is so unusual and like nothing we’ve seen before. It, however, is still in its experimental phase and won’t hit the market until 2017.

Pea ‘Masterpiece’ (Burpee)

Burpee is focusing its brand on meeting the lifestyle needs of consumers, with an emphasis on “foodies” and those with small spaces. This new pea will satisfy both! It has parsley-like tendrils, which can be used as garnish. So the entire plant is pretty much edible from tendril to pea to pod.