THE EARTH LAUGHS IN FLOWERS

At Flowerbox farm, we are all organic and a no spray farm.  we committed to sustainable and responsible farming practices. We use organic, natural fertilizers and only companion plantings or  benficial insect pest control methods to ensure that our flowers are healthy and free from all forever chemicals and that nothing we do hurts bees, birds or our wider enviroment .  Nothing anyone puts on a flower is safe for bee's, kill one thing, kill all things.   Neem oil works the same on every insect, everyanimal, same with horticultural oil, nothing is safe.  When people say organic, what that means is: no forever chemicals, not no killing. 

When flowers are flown in planes from overseas, that a massive amount of greenhouse gasses - and that's just the start.   Lets talk CHEMICALS, the ones that are banned in the USA but still used overseas.  This affects the growers, the handlers and in the end, you and everyone who comes into contact with those flowers.  These chemicals are toxid even in small amounts, so why bring them into the country.  On that note, its stil just the "peeing end of the pool" kind of thing.  We have to think globally and act locally.  Stay local, stay chemically clean. 

Also, by the time over-seas, lets say roses reach you, those roses have been out of water for at least 5 days and they have been harvested for at least 7 days.  This means that above all these rose have been bred for their ability to survive out of water and long vase life.  Becuase of tahis, one of the things sacrificed most often is: scent.  Most of the roses grown overseas and flown into this country have very little fragrance.   This is becuse the oils which carry the frangrance cause the roses to degrade at a much faster rate.  No way would one of our multipetaled, highly scented roses last out of water for five days.  Thats not to say there aren't lines of roses that look like English garden roses and they do have scent.  But lines of roses like this, must be processed much faster and shipped over night.  When so much labor and heavy shipping costs go into a line of roses like these, it makes the costs exhorbitant.   Plus, these roses, althought they may look like English Garden roses, they are still drenched in chemicals our country bans.

  The roses we grow locally here in Pasadena, and all of our flowers here on our urban micro-farm, are harvested either that morning or the night before.  We do not spray anything and only use organic composts and fertilizers.

Flowerbox Farms is a very small but mighty farm.  We have over 300 rose bushes in production or we are waiting impatiently for them to produce.  100's of Dalhias, Iris, Hellebores, Ranunculas, Butterfly Ranunculas, Anemones, Olive, Boxwood, Passionvine, Eucalyptus, and various other annuals.  We trial new things all of the time.  If they work, we keep them in the rotation!  We also have 14 trees that we have planted since we arrived on the property.  The trees are used for both food, like the lemons and the limes, and the peach and apple trees get used mostly for tiny fruit or blossom branches.  The persimmons and the figs are a battle every year, for a bunch of different reasons.