Lockdown seedling production in the plant plant | Discovery | Gardening Australia
Vložit
- čas přidán 30. 07. 2024
- With the unprecedented demand during lockdown, Josh explores how the nursery industry has kept up with vegetable seedling production.
Subscribe: ab.co/GA-subscribe
Josh is visiting Benara Nurseries in Perth, one of Australia’s largest wholesale production nurseries, to find out what it takes to get veggie seedlings to the market.
Marketing and Sales Manager, Carole Fudge, says “Vegetable [seedlings] is about three quarters of our production - we produce just short of 20 million seedlings a year. That’s purely for the home gardener, that’s not for the commercial vegetable growers in the country, and that’s just for west Australia.”
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, garden centres became busier than ever and this had a huge impact on seedling demand. “We went from wondering if we had to close the business to suddenly producing 5 times what we were producing before… we had to stop producing flowers to make room for the vegetables… we’ve never produced that many before!”
The production warehouse team works with several automated colleagues to pump out such a large number of seedlings. In the past, the seeds would be individually placed into each cell of a seed tray but the machines make the process quicker and more efficient by evenly distributing the seeds and completing one tray in the time it takes to place 3 seeds by hand! The 512 cells of a seedling tray are filled with seeds, top dressed with vermiculite, and watered in, all under the watchful eye of nursery staff. Once they have germinated, they are transplanted into larger punnets by a clever machine that recognises the type of plant and will leave behind any that don’t meet quality control size standards.
For plants that don’t like being transplanted so young, such as lettuce, beetroots, beans and peas, another machine sows seeds directly into larger punnets. It can pump out 10,000 punnets per hour! The punnets are filled with seed raising mix at the start of the production line, before a large, rolling dibber makes indents in soil ready for seeds to be dropped in. once planted, watered, and stacked, the plants move into the germination room where they are brought to life in a warm, humid environment.
Production staff play an important role in filling any gaps, cleaning up the punnets, and moving large volumes of seedlings into the main nursery where they tend to the growing seedlings for a few more weeks before they are ready for the home gardener. Depending on the variety and time of year, it takes around 10-12 weeks all together from seed to your garden.
The next time you buy seedlings from your local garden centre, have a think about the amazing journey these plants have already been on before they settle in at your place!
Filmed on Whadjuk Country
See the latest content from Gardening Australia as it goes live by hitting subscribe: ab.co/GA-subscribe
Watch Gardening Australia on ABC iview: iview.abc.net.au/programs/gard...
About Gardening Australia:
Gardening Australia is an ABC TV program providing gardening know-how and inspiration. Presented by Australia's leading horticultural experts, Gardening Australia is a valuable resource to all gardeners through the television program, the magazine, books, DVDs and extensive online content.
Connect with other Gardening Australia fans:
Like Gardening Australia on Facebook: / gardeningaustralia
Follow Gardening Australia on Instagram: / gardeningaustralia
Visit the Gardening Australia website: www.abc.net.au/gardening
This is an official Australian Broadcasting Corporation CZcams channel.
********
Contributions may be removed if they violate ABC's Online Conditions of Use www.abc.net.au/conditions.htm (Section 3). - Zábava
This was a fascinating story. Thanks so much G.A, I would have never known.
This is amazing! I embraced gardening during lockdown, and its great to hear of the surge in demand for these amazing businesses! Love those machines too!
I grow my own seeds, but I've always wondered what is in their seed raising mix.
This greenhouse is amazing! The vegetables look beautiful! It’s exciting to hear so many are starting to grow their own food! -Elissa
This is a pretty amazing operation they have going! Hopefully though people continue to support some of the smaller growers, cant imagine how tough it would be to try to compete with them
I was amazed to see that there is machinery that can transplant delicate seedlings so precisely that they don't disturb or damage the roots! It's also cool that so many people are inspired to garden because of the pandemic, even if just because they now have the time to- connecting with nature and the food we eat and getting back into the soil can be so healing.
I grow most of my seedlings. We are also on lockdown. I got my dirt at the supermarket. But living in the Netherlands our potting soil is awesome.
That machine that transplants the small punnets is insane! So complex and the photos for quality control is so awesome. My initial reaction to mass production of anything is sadness but when I think about how machines like these can drastically increase food production and help feed hungry populations I realize it is not always a bad thing.
As someone working in manufacturing, it is amazing to see how the high-yield, high-speed manufacturing machines can be applied in agriculture. -LM
This is a pretty amazing operation & procedures they have going! Hopefully though people continue to support some of the smaller growers, Lockdown seedling production in the plant plant is innovative.
The shear automation of the green house industry is astounding, especially the flex planter transplant machine. Expensive equipment, computerization and mechanization is required to meet a high demand that increase 5 folds this past year. With that much demand, hopefully theirs room left in the marketplace for smaller locally run and hand worked greenhouse operations to be successfully.
Wow, very interesting to see, thoroughly enjoyed watching the process.
Holy cow! that last machine was wild to watch! I wonder if it's delicate enough or if they end up losing many seedlings...obviously it's worth it for them to produce on such a large scale. One cool thing about machinery in nursery production is that actual humans still get to keep jobs doing quality control, cleanup, maintenance, etc. Better than just being completely machinated I guess. And it's cool that these nurseries were able to step up and increase their volumes 5x!
Brilliant. Loved this. I had no idea nursery automation machinery was so advanced.
And it was insightful to hear the effect of Covid on home gardening.
Buying mass produced seedlings has always resulted in higher death rates because they are never hardened off outdoors. Growing my own at home has been much more successful.
Wow. Just wow 😮
I would Love to work here!!!❤Thanks for sharing!!!
These machines are mesmerizing. I'd like to really crunch the numbers on this kind of operation. How much do they actually produce and how long does it take for a machine like that to pay itself off. It's crazy that their market is exclusively Western Australia.
Wow ,I hope one day my commercial seedlings production business in Ghana can go HITECH as this
Serious production!
Lovely greens
Great information
Very cool! Thank you 😊
Amazing
Oh my goodness 🤩
Great watch
Well done.
Wow
Great 👍 👌
Watching that automated machine work was so memorizing. Idk if it's sad or a good that this business is becoming automated. I suppose that reduces greenhouse workers but increases need for mechinacs.
I have worked for more than ten years in the field of vegetable seed production, but now due to the bad working conditions in Iran, I am looking for a job offer for immigration, can you help me?
So Laura Dern is now Laura Garden.
What about the seeds, where they come from... Collected etc..?
I was interested too, I'd say machines extract them from the fruit after processing. Found this info:
Seed extraction: The ripe fruit is halved and the pulp and seed squeezed into a plastic bucket. The pulp is frequently stirred over a period of two to three days while fermentation takes place and until most of the seeds are free from pulp and settle out. Surface pulp containing any light seed is poured off. The remaining seed is repeatedly washed and drained until free of pulp. It is then spread thinly on paper and dried. Dry seed may be kept in airtight con- tainers such as screw-top glass jars and will retain its viability for several years. Separation of seed from pulp can be hastened if hydrochloric acid is added to the pulp. Use 1 fluid ounce of concentrated hydrochloric acid to 5 lb. of pulp. The mixture should be stirred from time to time over a period of three hours. The seed should then be separated and carefully washed several times in fresh water to remove acid
You'd think Aunty of all folks would have subtitles on their videos.
good morning
Australia is COVID now free. 👍🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼good job!
Jobs gone to machinery again but the seedlings aren't any cheaper. I'll grow my own thanks.🌱🌱🌱
Do you live in a gunyah and walk everywhere rather than own a car?
Not a single mask worn by anyone in the video during this pandemic; however, with the job-eliminating automation embraced by this business, soon it will have only one employee and will not need to be concerned about human disease transmission.
this was filmed in WA and they were both outdoors and far apart from one another, not everywhere has it as bad as where ever you live
U need way many more workers then one even if you have ful automatic. Look at car production its fully auto but still needs workers to check the work.
Thwbjnyiu four the video
That’s a lot of plastic.
As long as they're strong/durable we gardeners can reuse them infinitely!
Watch your Weight!!!