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Holland Trip To Nieuwkoop Nurseries - Aalsmeer
May 12th – 16th 2008
By Debbie Kendrick
Monday 12th May 2008
Carrie and I were up very early to catch the ferry from Harwich on our adventure to Holland on behalf of Flora Tec. We travelled on a very large ship and the journey took approximately 6 hours but we managed to pass the time as it was a glorious day, though after a while the view of just sea did get a little monotonous.
Despite the lack of satellite navigation, maps or directions in English we managed to navigate our way from the ferry port to Aalsmeer, just south of Amsterdam, our destination for the week.
It was Bank Holiday in Holland so we searched in vain for an open café or restaurant for dinner. We had to settle at the hotel instead for our first meal and an early night for two very tired travellers.
Tuesday 13th May 2008
Another early start. We met met Martien Lek at 6.30am (5.30am UK time) outside the hotel, who guided us to Nieuwkoop De Kwakel (Nieuwkoop Nurseries) just 15 minutes from Aalsmeer. Work started at 7am sharp after a quick cup of tea.
After a brief introduction to Hydroculture (or Hydroponics), Dennis put us to work with Matthiew. We both had to don rather fetching ill-fitting wellies for the task of moving a couple of hundred small Ficus Benjamina which had already been potted into Hydro corrals a few weeks previously, and were now being moved into the ‘Hot House’ for faster development. The whole atmosphere within the greenhouses was very hot and humid and made working conditions quite hard, but apparently you get used to it! We learnt that it’s very important to set them out in straight lines in the Hydro beds which creates a fantastic impression for any visiting clients.
The next department we visited was Soil Spraying, where we met Ron and Else. This should have been our first stop but the plants hadn’t arrived first thing. Basically we were converting the soil plants, which arrive on trolleys, to Hydro. First we removed the pots, then scraped off as much soil as possible by hand into large skips, to be used by local farmers. The next step was to wash any remaining soil off using high power jets; for this we wore rather large aprons as it was very messy, hot and dirty.
The roots are then dipped into a bacterial solution to protect them and potted into special pots using Hydro corrals (leca to you and me). They are then watered thoroughly and introduced to the first nursery beds, from which Carrie and I had moved a batch earlier.
The third department we visited on our first day was Filomena’s, who was from Portugal. She tried to get us to ride bikes as it’s faster to get around the acres of greenhouses, but Carrie couldn’t pedal hers and mine had no brakes so we opted to walk instead! Filomena was in charge of all the small (ie 13cm) Hydro plants in raised beds - thousands of them, a lot for one person. Here we dead leaved hundreds of Agloenemas which had recently been converted to Hydroculture. We were amazed at the variety of plants available in Hydroculture, even Sanseveria and Zammioculcas.
We finished at 5pm, very weary after a bit of a culture shock. We really had worked very hard on our first day and learned quite a lot about Hydroculture; it is a very labour intensive business to be in. About 80% of Nieuwkoop’s business is in Hydroculture now, with a very small amount in soil.
Wednesday 14th May 2008
For our second day at Nieuwkoop we started again with Filomena, learning to prune Ficus balls - light pruning if they are likely to be picked for shipping in the next few days or harder pruning if they are to remain in the nursery for a longer time.
After tea break we headed back to get our wellies again and back into the ‘Hot House’, where we set about helping Else to ring hundreds of fast growing Ficus Amstel Queen, tying in all the new shoots and encouraging them to grow up the canes.
After lunch we met Maurice in the Production department. We helped him to plant up Hydro displays ready for shipping to customers the following day.
Finally we relished the opportunity to walk around the nursery and explore - it was like one of the glasshouses at Kew!
Thursday 15th May 2008
Our final day working at the nursery was spent entirely in the Picking department, picking orders and preparing them for shipping to customers. We both loved whizzing round on the little motorized trucks picking pots, liners, plants, artificial flowers and fruit and any other items which were required, then loading them onto trolleys and arranging them for packing and subsequent shipping when the lorries came in to collect them the following day.
We also had an opportunity to look around the huge showroom, which showcases the many containers that are available through Nieuwkoop.
Friday 16th May 2008
Another early start. Martien met us at the hotel and we followed him to the Bloemenveiling, or Flower Auction. The auction starts at 4am but we arrived at about 6.30am and had a chance to look around the flower wholesalers first. Then Martien took us in to the Clock Auction, which is a real experience. The buyers have to be specially trained to be able to bid in the auction because things happen so fast, as trolley after trolley full of plants of all shapes and sizes flow past at speed on conveyor belts, four lines at a time. This is where major retailers such as B&Q buy their plants too.
Then it was back to the nursery one last time to say goodbye and thank all the people that we’d met during our week at Nieuwkoop.
To sum up our week, we both felt it went very well and was definitely worthwhile. We learned a lot about Hydroculture, so now we can talk to our customers about the advantages of growing plants in water rather than soil. We worked very hard in order to fit in with the staff at Nieuwkoop and they were all very friendly and most of them spoke excellent English, which helped immensely!
Thank you to Nieuwkoop for hosting us and to Flora-Tec for sending us there.
© 2008 Flora-tec. Head Office, Unit 1, Unwins Farms, Cottenham Road, Histon, Cambridge, CB24 9ES
Flora-tec Limited, Registered Office at Head Office, Registration No. 3378810 (England), VAT Registered No. GB 927183118