Richard G. Thomas
James A. Chatfield
From September 25-29, 2000, the Ohio State University Extension Nursery Landscape and Turf Team (ENLTT) traveled for a study tour to the province of Ontario, Canada. Here are some observations from that study tour from northeast Ohio landscaper Rick Thomas and from the other ENLTTers involved.
In the last week of September, I was lucky to travel with five members of the Extension Nursery Landscape and Turf Team to Canada on the team's annual fact-finding trip. The plan was to visit nurseries, research stations, horticultural gardens, and even a winery. The purpose of the trip was to experience how others in the green industry operate, exchange ideas with our Canadian colleagues, and in general observe and bring back information to share.
As the only business person on the trip, I tended to notice different things besides bugs and diseases. For example, despite visiting several wholesale nurseries and a retail garden center, I never once saw a landscaper's truck. Not a lawn mower, nor skid steer loader, or even a pickup truck with a logo or name. Compared to most communities in our state, where a landscaper's truck can be seen practically at every traffic light, this was very surprising.
Despite not seeing any landscapers around, we were assured they existed and, through their Ontario Landscape Association, were up in arms over the proposed elimination of all pesticides for "cosmetic" use in the next five years. The ecology movement in Ontario appears to be much stronger - even fanatical - compared to what we are used to seeing here.
At the University of Guelph's botanical garden, we were given a tour by their head horticulturalist who has some very strong opinions. For example, he would like to see all plant species not native to Canada banned from the country. He represents the extreme side of a popular movement that has gathered public strength and political clout.
The city of Ottawa, the capital of Ontario, has banned the use of chemicals for several years. According to a researcher at the Ontario's Turf Research Station, the capital building's lawn has very little grass left, a testimony to uncontrolled weed growth. The situation in Canada showed me the importance of a plan such as IPM and the possible political results from uncontrolled squirt-gun botany.
I have always believed in continuing education for my employees and myself. Whether it is an in-house training program or an Extension class, my company has paid for and benefitted from the knowledge gleaned from these classes. Therefore, I was excited when I found out about the University of Guelph's correspondence courses in horticulture and landscaping. These courses can be ordered over the Internet.
The education program is structured using video tapes and text combined for such courses as plant ID, horticulture I, II, III, nursery management, and much more. You could order courses for training employees or even receive a diploma in three to five year of at-home study. One of the best parts of this is that the cost is very reasonable. Not only is the Canadian money exchange rate in Ohioans' favor, but the cost of most of the courses is less than $350 before the money exchange.
How many different nationalities do you work with? I'm sure the shortage of labor has shown itself at your workplace, and maybe like many other green industry companies, persons of foreign origin are now working with you.
One nursery we visited was maybe the largest we saw. In the course of the tour around the farm, we saw Asians operating potting machines, a Swedish greenhouse manager, Hispanic nursery laborers, and, of course, Canadians. When the owner was asked how many different nationalities worked there, he pointed to the flags of 12 different nations that flew over the entrance.
Certainly standards and customs differ from business to business not to mention country to country. We visited a retail garden center and, while others went to look around, I visited the business's designer. No computers here; all their drawings are done by hand. The designer explained that any client with measurements and pictures could have a landscape plan drawn for a $75 gift certificate to the garden center as their only fee.
Also, even though they supplied no installation or delivery service, they guarantee their plants for two years from the date of purchase. I know some garden shops that won't guarantee anything after it goes out the door, yet here was one giving a two-year unconditional guarantee. And successfully, the shop owner told me. They have few returns in the first year and almost none in the second.
She also told me that her average sale when a drawing was done is in excess of $1,200. She was satisfied that her design marketing strategy was working.
It would be a long book if I included all the interesting ideas and observations that I was privileged to experience in Ontario, plus you would be lucky to stay awake. But sometime take a drive up to Niagara Falls and visit the city's horticultural park and school just northeast of town. It's a very interesting place.
After assembling at Randy Zondag's in Lake County on Sept. 25, we traveled to Guelph, Hamilton, the Ontario countryside, and Niagara Falls. The tripsters included Joe Boggs, Jim Chatfield, Erik Draper, Mary Maloney, Stephanie Miller (ODNR), Amy Stone, and Rick Thomas (Barberton landscaper). Here are some highlights:
This is a beautiful facility and research plots. Cooperative funding with the industry, with some industry offices in the facility as well as university and Ministry employees. Yearly Turf Manager's Short Course is in its 28th year; attracts students from across the country; involves the entire month of February; and has a cost of $2,000.
We toured plots that included 30 12-foot-diameter (4-feet deep) toxicology ponds in which various pesticides and other chemical compounds were assayed for effects on everything from phytoplankton and zooplankton to various vascular plants and invertebrate and vertebrate animals.
Numerous golf course projects, including what may be one of the world's few divot-making machines, used to assess how to correct golfer's divots.
Web site: gti.uoguelph.ca
The University of Guelph has quite an extensive distance-education program, offering 150 courses and videotapes that can be taken individually or as part of 25 "industry-recognized certificates, or as part of the Ontario Diploma in Horticulture or the Ontario Diploma in Agriculture."
Diploma programs are available in everything from Animal Care to Urban Tree Care, from Golf Course Maintenance to Managing for Sustainable Environments.
Intriguingly, the University of Guelph is looking for a U.S. university partner for its programs and, even more intriguingly, is in search of one with web-based expertise. You can learn more about their programs by contacting:
519-824-4120 Ext. 3375 or 519-767-5050
The fax number is 519-824-98136.
There are a number of interesting pesticide issues in Ontario. There is a move afoot over the next five years to provide municipalities in the province of Ontario with the power to ban "cosmetic" pesticide use on public lands. The term "cosmetic" was tough to pin down, but actually seems to be targeted currently at use on turfgrasses on lawns (weed control, grub control). There also are a number of Canada-wide pesticide-reduction initiatives in the works.
Predictably, there was a range of perspectives about the initiatives among the University of Guelph people we met, including Henry Koch, horticulturist at the Arboretum, who characterized the umbrella Landscape Ontario trade organization as having a "mandate" promoting indiscriminate pesticide usage. When pressed on this characterization, we all had a lively point-counterpoint discussion.
Native Plants/Family Reunion
The University of Guelph Arboretum has a program for preserving rare Ontario native plants. One component of this was a vast survey, now 85% completed, which involved volunteers surveying 10km by 10km grids throughout the province and recording species incidence. They had an extensive plant identification educational program associated with this project. They have a collection in the arboretum displaying many of the plants that were the focus of this survey.
They also have a World of Trees collection that displays trees in plant family co-horts, which Henry calls a Family Reunion collection. Another project they are undertaking at Guelph is an American (white) elm breeding program, in which they are searching for geographically separated Ulmus americana with tolerance to Ceratocystis ulmi for breeding purposes.
Crabapples
Malologists were fascinated by the production of 'Dolgo' seedlings at Sheridan Nursery. 'Dolgo' is a large-fruited crabapple not considered highly ornamental in Ohio and in other trials.
However, Sheridan produces 75,000 'Dolgo' seedlings a year - and would do 150,000 a year if they could find enough seed. Why? 'Dolgo' is widely used in Oregon and Washington for a rootstock for apples and crabapples and also as a pollinator for apples.
In their production here, they are finding that they get much better growth when lining out the 'Dolgo' using plastic much. There was also a lovely 'Dolgo' espalier at the Royal Botanic Gardens which we visited later in the day.
Arborvitaes
Thuja is widely used for windbreaks throughout Ontario and is the common way of separating nursery crop fields. Another use: At the Royal Botanic Gardens (RBG) there is a lovely maze constructed of a range of different-sized and -shaped Thuja occidentalis selections.
The Green Series
Sheridan Nurseries is the originator of the Green Series of hardy boxwoods - 'Green Gem,' 'Green Mountain,' 'Green Velvet,' and 'Green Mound.' They are touted as hardy and undamaged to -30ºF, and the severe winter of 1993 in Ohio (-28ºF at Secrest Arboretum in Wooster) was a positive confirmation. The Green Series plants are hybrids between Buxus koreana and Buxus sempervirens. There is a discussion of these boxwoods in Dirr's Manual of Woody Landscape Plants of course, with his ever pithy, opinionated commentary, to whit: "There is an American Boxwood Society [address given], that 'Boxophiles' should consider joining if all other societies are full."
Bog Mats
The Royal Botanic Garden has gotten into growing water plants in a big way due to the need for supplying plant material for wetland restorations. One problem was how to plant into such sites; they tried many techniques including attaching rocks to the plants to facilitate rooting (and prevent the plants floating from the desired sites).
Ultimately, they developed bog mats (made of coconut fiber) that the desired plants were rooted into; these could then be readily harvested and transported to the desired sites. The mats gradually degrade in situ.
Water Management
Connon's Nursery was bedeviled with water shortages in past years. Almost their entire source was from a stream and series of ponds running through their land. In the 1999 drought, they used 34 million gallons of water, compared to 14 million gallons this year.
As co-owner Case Van Den Kruk noted: "I cannot go through another year wondering each night where my water is coming from the next day. The nursery business is hard enough as it is."
Now runoff water used for irrigating field nursery stock is collected in a series of ponds where it can be recycled. Second, several of his newer greenhouses had pipes connected to the gutters that channeled rain water into large concrete cisterns.
Grapes
Grape acreage in Ontario is at 20,000 acres and rising. Various Prunus plantings are at 15,000 acres, with about 9,000 acres of this in peaches (according to Vinelanders, if Ontario was a U.S. state, their peach production would be 5th). They also grow some pears (Bartlett still #1, Bosc #2).
Due to the moderating effects of the lake and their comparative southernliness relative to the rest of country, the Niagara area is known as the Banana Belt of Canada.
Frost
At the Chateau des Charmes winery, they were concerned about frost the night after we visited. A temperature of -1ºC was predicted, so they were thinking of activating their system of 25 windmills to keep the cold air from settling.
The windmills were costly to install ($500,000) but seemed a bargain to them compared to the $2,000 per hour that they were paying for helicopters.
Mission RSVP
At Mori Garden Center, they had a clever way to remember their Mission Statement. In its entirety it was:
RSVP. Reliable Service and Value in Plants.
They specialized in services and high-margin plants, including a $5,000 Japanese maple and a $1,200 reindeer juniper topiary. They had two-year guarantees on their plant material, with 1% returns in most years, and 2% returns in last year's drought.
And now...speaking of the bugs and blights so cavalierly dismissed by Master Thomas:
Viburnum Leaf Beetle
We saw damage from the viburnum leaf beetle, Pyrrhalta viburni. This skeletonizing pest causes significant damage from both larval and adult feeding.
We do not yet have it in Ohio, but the pest is definitely in Guelph, and we saw it causing what Henry Koch in the arboretum in Guelph described as "far less than normal" damage on American cranberrybush viburnum, resulting in a very ratty appearance to the planting.
In a recent American Nurseryman article, Cornell entomologists noted that this pest was nearing the Pennsylvania border, so it is probably only a matter of time before it visits the Buckeye State.
Rose Twig Girdler
A major problem Henry Koch has in the rose garden is the rose twig girdler, causing stem swellings and then girdling on a wide range of roses. Henry is evaluating which roses are less affected and was pleased that some dog rose, Rosa caninus, selections were doing well while many Rosa rugosa types had been devastated, resulting in the arboretum staff rejuvenatively pruning them almost back to the ground.
Another pest that is not causing this kind of damage in our fair state.
Apple Scab
Plenty of apple scab was defoliating the mature crabapples lining the entrance to the University of Guelph - proving once again the importance of disseminating research on comprehensive crabapple evaluations (which was duly done). In the Arboretum, there was a lovely specimen of Malus baccata var. mandschurica with lovely clean leaves and dark sherry red fruits.
Mistletoe
A fantastic sight was a true mistletoe (Viscum album) growing on the stems of a Malus floribunda at the RBG. Haustoria sunk into the stems, hemiparasitically sucking nutrients from the crabapples to complement its chlorophyllous food production.
Sweat Tents
The sweat tents at Connon's Nursery were quite interesting. The propagation material was rooted into a peat base, watered very infrequently, and kept for long periods of establishment in very high relative humidity conditions. Propagator Arie said there were very few problems from Botrytis and other diseases with his system, despite conditions that would seem to be perfect for many fungal pathogens.
Plum Pox
Plum pox (viral disease; aphid vector; affects Prunus crops except cherries) was all the talk among fruit researchers at Vineland. It has been found numerous times in Ontario, so there are inspections, quarantines, some tree removals - and great concern.
Bordeaux Mix
When we were at Chateau des Charmes, the blue clouds of Bordeaux Mixture (copper hydroxide and hydrated lime) were being applied using an air-blast sprayer. It is used for downy mildew (#2 grape disease) and less so for powdery mildew (#1 grape disease). We chatted a bit about the origination of Bordeaux mix in the pre-germ theory of disease era in the early second half of the 19th Century, when Alexis Millardet, noticing that the vile mix he sprayed on the grapes along the vineyard road to discourage schoolchildren and grape pilferers, was controlling downy mildew compared to unsprayed unintentional "controls."
Mists and Diseases
Near Niagara Falls, the closer you got to the mist chamber of the falls the more hammered the horsechestnuts were by Guignardia blotch disease. It was remindful of the loss of sycamores to anthracnose at Mirror Lake on the Ohio State University campus once the fountains were installed.
Lots of Rhytisma tar spot on maples near the Falls as well. Also, near Niagara Falls was the only dogwood powdery mildew we saw in the entire Ontario trip.
Mushrooms
Dan Rinker headed a mushroom production research group at Vineland. He showed us spawning rooms with Agaricus bisporus (the most commonly available commercial mushroom) in various stages of development, from piles of compost inoculated with Agaricus-infested rye to a stage where inoculated casing had been added and induced button production.
Vineland also has a project growing Agaricus blazei, a medicinal mushroom touted for anti-carcinogen properties which is now selling for $400 per dry kilo in some U.S. markets.
One of the fascinating things about mushroom culture is the fact that growers must contend with mycoparasites - fungi that cause diseases of the mushroom fungus. Especially fascinating is that one of these fungal fungal pathogens is a species of Verticillium, namely Verticillium fungicola, which causes a disease called "dry bubble." Other fungal pathogens Dan talked about were Mycogene sp. ("wet bubble") and Cladobotryon dendroides.
He also noted that Trichoderma harzianum, a fungus used as a biological control of many root pathogens in crop culture, is causing them problems by somehow limiting mushroom fruiting-body production.
Dan also talked about the inherent difficulties in using fungicides for fungal pathogen control in mushroom production. Of the three that they do use, zineb has limited efficacy; benomyl does not help with Verticillium; and chlorothalonil has too much mycotoxicity on Agaricus. Good sanitation and roguing practices are keys for successful growers.
In 2001, ENLTT will not be taking an out-of-state Study Tour, but instead will be touring Ohio with a barnstorming series of horticultural programs for the Ohio green industry and all the citizens of Ohio.
Look for announcements of this tour and join us during the week of: