Episode 114: houseplants and sustainability part two - the nursery trade

Houseplants on display at Sage Houseplants in Manitoba, Canada. Photograph: Dave Hanson.

Transcript

Episode 114

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Jane: Hello! And welcome to On the Ledge Podcast, the show for people who are just popping to the garden centre for a look and in no way end up spending their entire food budget on succulents. No way. Never.

This week we're continuing the show's occasional series on sustainability interviewing Dave Hanson who is owner of Sage Garden Greenhouses and the co-host of The Grow Guide podcast. He's been on a mission to make sure that his business grows plants sustainably, so we're going to highlight some of the main components of sustainable gardening and find out what to look out for when you're choosing where to source your plants. Plus, I'm answering a question about that old sore, variegation in aroids.

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Jane: The first and most thrilling. If you've ever listened to one of those crime drama podcasts where you never actually find out who dunnit, you may have been wondering if our story about the mystery Peperomia spotted by Charlotte in a Montreal café was going to end in a disappointing conclusion. Oh, ye of little faith. This is On the Ledge Podcast! With a listenership so fiercely intelligent and tenacious that once they've got their teeth into an investigation they're never going to let go. And so, if you remember, Charlotte wanted help identifying a red-stemmed Peperomia that looked a bit like a Chinese Money Plant, our old friend Pilea peperomioides. 'But what's up with the red stems?' Charlotte was wondering. We had various suggestions as to what the plant was after I aired this question and we also had a theory that it was a Chinese Money Plant that had been given extra carbon dioxide in the greenhouse where it was raised, or that the plant was under stress. But what we really needed was a picture of the plant.

I put a call out for Montreal listeners to come forward and a couple did up and volunteer themselves to check out this mystery plant. And Clara was the listener who ended up going on this mission for On the Ledge. She had a bit of a struggle because the plant wasn't in the same spot as it was when Charlotte visited but she emailed me with a triumphant picture of the plant a few days ago. So, I promptly posted this onto Facebook and had some great responses. Everyone got very excited let's put it that way. But the conclusion was that it was indeed a Pilea peperomioides. And Leon van Eck, who's a biologist and a listener to On the Ledge, provided an excellent piece of evidence for us. He had two pots of Pilea peperomioides, two divisions made from the original mother plant. One grown in deep shade in the greenhouse, and one exposed to a lot more direct sun. And he posted the picture of these two plants and said, "Note the red petals on the plant on the left. I hope this explains the phenotypic variation seen in this species as being likely environmental, rather than genetic." And I will post that picture in the show notes so you can take a look.

If you've never heard that term before, phenotypic variation, then let me just explain. That just means the variations that occur within a plant's species. So, for example if you see a dandelion growing in a crack in the pavement. It will look a lot weaker and smaller than a dandelion growing in a lush lawn where it's getting lots of light, nutrients and food. They're not different species but they are being affected by the environment that they're in. And it's just the same for this Chinese Money Plant. Put it in greater sun and plant reacts by changing the balance of pigments in the foliage. So, take a look at your Pilea peperomioides and see how it's looking, and maybe try moving it to a sunnier or shadier spot and see if it works for you.

Thanks to everyone for your responses to this particular query, and it's been such fun, so if you've got a mystery that you'd like On the Ledge to solve, then please do send me an email. I would love to help and so would our band of wonderfully passionate listeners. You just need to email and I will do the best I can to help you. Lots of information is great; pictures, locations, story behind the plant. Waffle on as long as you'd like and that will help me to answer your question as accurately as I can.

And a special greeting to four individuals who are new to the One the Ledge Patreon family, Miranda, Memo, Leah and Cindel who have all become Legends and are no doubt bingeing on all the extra content you get if you donate $5 a month, or more, to keep On The Ledge going, and fund important things like transcripts, new equipment, travel to interview people, and all the stuff that makes On The Ledge work. So thank you, thank you, thank you to those four new Patreon subscribers. Find out how you can become a Patreon subscriber in the show notes at www.JanePerrone.com.

And many thanks also to Dejavudia, who left a review of On the Ledge on Apple Podcasts, saying, "I love listening to Jane and keeping up with her outings." Yes, I love going on outings, it's a great pleasure to be able to do that for On the Ledge. "Her Q&A is always helpful, and the jazzy music is always a plus." Star emoji. I don't know what that emoji is called, perhaps it's not called star emoji; the one with the big star and the two little stars. It's an underused one, I think we should all start using that. Thank you very much for that review, 5 stars natch. And if you want to leave a review for On the Ledge and haven't done so, get your skates on, get over to your Pod App of choice, and say what you want to say about On the Ledge because that way you can help other people find the show, and generally give me a warm and fuzzy feeling inside, which is always good.

So, without any further ado, let's get on with the main interview for this episode. If you haven't listened to episode 103, which is 'Houseplants and Sustainability part 1,' where I talk about peat free compost with Sean Higgs of Floralive, the carnivorous plant expert, then do go and have a listen to that first, because that show does lay out some of the issues with peat that we expand on in this episode. But sustainability is about much more than peat as we find out in our interview with Dave. I'll let Dave introduce himself.

Dave: So, my name is Dave Hanson and I'm the owner/co-manager of Sage Garden Greenhouses in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, I'm also the co-host of The Grow Guide podcast and long-time gardening columnist here for local radio and a variety of media as well.

Jane: So sustainability is at the heart of what you do, but was that a sudden epiphany or have you been doing this for a long time?

Dave: Well, this is definitely something that's had an evolution over both the 22 years that have evolved as a commercial grower, and when I started my business as a really young guy, and it basically grew out of a note. I was at a pub one night and I had been working at a garden centre and I thought, 'To heck with working for someone else, I'm going to start my own business,' and literally was renting greenhouses and kind of doing everything improv, but the one thing that stood out to me right from the very beginning was just how much when I went to other garden centres they kind of smelled of chemicals. And I did not like the idea of becoming involved in a business in an industry where I would go to work and be surrounded by basically a chemical aroma. And secondly, when I first started my business, I was very much keen on growing a lot of unusual edibles, a lot of herbs, and that's all about the sensory and aromatic type experience. And I really wanted to feel confident for my own purposes but also as I share that with others, that the plant material, I've invited everyone to scratch and sniff to kind of get intimate with, would be very, very healthy.

So right from the beginning this was a central, guiding message in how I wanted to go about growing things, and as a young gardener as well, I'd always grown up in an environment where sustainability was important. Both my parents are very much believers in sustainability and had been hippies out of the sixties and seventies so I kind of had a background that way as well, but as the business grew, there were definitely epiphanies along the way, in terms of how we could take this to the next level, how can we source organic fertilizers and find solutions for the various problems that come up as you start to grow instead of a few thousand plants, if you start to grow tens of thousands of plants. Things do change.

Jane: I guess when you're growing on a large scale, the issues are different. In fact I was interviewing somebody about the issue of peat for another publication that I write for, and they were pointing out -- which had never really occurred to me before -- that when you've got a nursery and you're thinking of trying a different potting soil formulation that doesn't include peat or is more sustainable in some way or other, you can't just go "Oh I'm just going to sample a couple of bags of this." You know, it's a major operation to change your potting mix and so I guess that's an issue when you're growing on a large scale. Everything has to planned far in advance, you can't have supplies failing or things going wrong because that's your livelihood.

Dave: That's a really central point, and along our journey towards more and more sustainable type of operation we've had a few of those hiccups where we had a supplier for example recommended a new kind of fertilizer, it was called Turkey Trod that we thought we could mix into our potting mix, and the only thing that went wrong with this is they told us to mix it in at a ratio that was ten times the actual recommended amount. And we were like, "Well it's springtime let's go for it, we're going to mix it into all of these pots here." And that was a pretty devastating situation when the plants basically became burned even through it was an organic type fertilizer it was very, very rich and some plants, like basil, kind of glowed green and other plants just turned this limp horrible colour really fast. So yeah you have to plan, you have to be aware of a longer-term strategy, and I think that's one of the reasons that some of the larger operations, and even some of the medium and smaller sized operations, have been reluctant to do a lot of experimenting, or stayed very focused on maybe say their tomato plants, or their edible section, but not necessarily to undertake to be more of an organic sustainable type organization throughout the whole facility.

Jane: Tell me the temperature on peat in Canada. Are people trying to reduce the use of it? Or is it just seen as something you've got so much of it's not a problem?

Dave: You're spot on in that I'm right in the heart of peat land. We are in one of the places in Canada -- in Manitoba -- where a lot of the horticultural peat is dug from the ground and transported out throughout North America so it's definitely an industry here and so that has some bearing on people's attitudes for sure. No questions there's a lot of awareness that peat is a non-renewable resource that has tons of issues associated with how it's being removed how that affects the landscape and whether that landscape would ever return to what it once was. The peat companies of course have tried to argue that they're finding increasingly sustainable ways to not pillage I guess you could say, but no question that it's not a sustainable option.

Locally, because the industry is so heavy on peat, I would agree that many people talk about this, they think about it, and then fall short on solutions. I know that in other parts of North America, California places like that, there's the option of rice hulls. I know that out of the US there's a company now that's doing a lot with wood fibre that's been turned into basically a growing medium, and locally we've been trying to work with a company that does a lot with an organic wheat straw. So, there are options out there. And a couple of factors I think that're coming into play here, one is what you talked about earlier, that is someone has to be able to jump into this and think they're going to get the same results because customers are not going to be very, consumers at the end of the day aren't going to be very willing to accept a sub-par product, or a product that is much more expensive, or a product that is not on schedule if a grower decides to make a change.

So we have a lot of research and development I think that needs to take place and you have to have financial resources to do that, so we have to have some companies that are, or the government or universities or someone who's willing to take the risk to really do proper trials, to be able to introduce to market true alternatives for this big industry we have. But on a smaller scale, I think home gardeners are finding that there are tons of solutions, and that's the exciting part. Absolutely things like coconut husk fibres are one of them, rice hulls are definitely something you can mix with compost and you can create very nice growing mediums. Now I don't know about wheat straw yet, it's something we're experimenting with because in my part of Canada in the prairies we have great access to wheat straw, and not necessarily certified organic which is what we need to source, but there is some certified organic material available and so we're working with a local company to try and develop that into an actual alternative to peat moss. There's lots of R&D happening, but it's one of those uphill kind of slow momentum things, but the snowball is starting to grow, that's for sure.

Jane: Interesting you mention rice hulls, because I've been investigating alternatives to Perlite, which is another non-renewable resource, which is I believe mined from the ground. And rice hulls were the one thing that came up were supposedly a good, potential, alternative. I did find an article, admittedly at the website Perlite.org, so I suspect there's something to be aware of in terms of reading the piece, talking about the saying that rice hulls are not a viable alternative to Perlite. I'm going to get, I'm going to experiment with it and see how I get on because I really don't like working with Perlite, I find it very dusty and unpleasant to work with. So, if I can find an organic alternative that is not a non-renewable resource I will, but it seems we're in the very early days with this kind of stuff.

Dave: I would definitely agree with that. Thinking back to 22 years ago, when I first got into commercial growing, there was a real transition happening out of mineral soil and into the peat based soil-less media, which has a lot of convenience associated with it, and back in the day when growers would have that mineral soil, they would load it up with chemicals nonetheless to sterilize it, but I think that there's a return to the concept of living actual soil as the alternative, which can also have its pros and cons. Certainly top soil is not a sustainable solution either because that's being taken off the land and leaving behind a very scarred landscape for development or whatever is going to happen there, but the idea of returning to actual soils and getting away from the idea these alternative soil-less type growing spaces, like the growing mediums, I think is one of the ways forward.

Jane: For those of us who are on the other end of the equation, as consumers, the trouble is is it's just so easy to walk into the garden centre and pick up that bag which says, might well say, 'organic' on it and make us feel good with a picture of a nice houseplant on the front and think 'Oh we're doing a good thing here.' The time and energy which is required to actually do your research.

Dave: I would agree that the, as much as DIY is very much a great thing that a lot of people love to do various kinds of DIY, there is that convenience factor when you just want to go home and pot your plants, you don't want to spend four hours researching and sourcing rice hull and doing different things so hopefully in the next little while there will be some alternatives. I think that though the wood fibre pulp -- which can be derived from sustainable sources -- perhaps rice hulls, there are some things that might come along in the near future because there is momentum building on this. And consumers have a say, if consumers go to garden centres and they ask, I think that we start to have more of a voice to make change, there's no question.

Jane: With that in mind, do you produce for direct to consumers or are you producing for garden centres and nurseries who then sell to consumers, what's your...?

Dave: Yeah, sure thing. At Sage Garden we are very much a direct-to-consumer type business and this is a very intentional decision. At the very beginning there was kind of a combination of wholesaling to other garden centres and selling to customers, but we've really appreciated and have a lot of passion for the opportunity to both listen and hear from gardeners as to what sort of challenges they're experiencing. They are, of course, craving all kinds of knowledge and information, and that's one of the things we love to do is share that back with people and so as a grower, one of the things that has been a strength for us is the opportunity to align our gardener education with the way we do things ourselves. There's a lot of authenticity in it and I sensed from our customers that they really feel that when they come to our business because it does smell good and there's not that chemical aroma, and they can see the products that we're using and we're kind of a medium sized garden centre, we're not a gigantic place and we're not a little tiny place either. But there's enough of a scale where they can see the operation is happening right there, and they can see what we're doing, that there's a lot of transparency. And so we appreciate that and that gives people a chance to really ask how we do things and why we do things and how that can translate into helpful suggestions for them at home.

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Jane: We'll be back with more from Dave shortly, but first let's hear from this week's show sponsor.

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Jane: What things should we as consumers be looking out for when we go into, or when we're buying from a supplier, in terms of red flags or things that we need to look out for that we might not be aware of? So, for example, ok, this plant may come in a fancy coya pot that's recyclable, but actually it's full of neonicotinoids or some other issue. Are there sort of hidden things that we need to be aware of when it comes to sustainability that's not always obvious from looking at the plant?

Dave: You have touched on probably the central problem here, is there's some fairly obvious things that a lot of people put out there to sort of create an impression, or to do their parts. It's not always just greenwashing but sometimes trying to take some steps towards sustainability, but then the industry, wherever you are, whether you're in North America, whether you're in Europe, whether you're in Great Britain, definitely this has become a global industry, and so a plant you find on the shelf of your local garden centre probably hasn't started life there. It might has started out at a cutting farm in Africa or in South America, or in South East Asia. And so along the way there's a lot of different types of regulations that might govern how plants are grown in different regions, there's definitely export requirements for chemical drenches. There's all kinds of different applications of rules and so your plant that arrives on your local garden centre shelf has had a long journey, and there's a high likelihood that it hasn't been a very organic one. So it's important to try to, I think, and I will be fully honest here I'm an independent garden centre operator and gardening educator and so my goal is to try to have those conversations with people and I encourage people to try and come to me with these questions, but when you go to many garden centres it can be difficult to find out the provenance of plants really. They might have to say, "Well we grow them here," but probably that means that they've gotten in plug material that has come from quite far away. So, starting to get to know some of the specifics, so what kinds of chemicals have been applied, are there neonics applied? I know in North America there's still a lot of controversy about this, and many of the commercial growers did not want to have a program where you'd have to label plants 'as treated with neonics' but consumers started to demand this, so in some jurisdictions that is a requirement but it's very inconsistent to this point in time. A lot of the houseplant industry suffers from this problem because these plants travel from a very global perspective and they cross boundaries and borders there is often export requirements to have them be drenched, and the most common types of chemical drenches for pest management are neonicotinoid insecticides. So there's a lot of things that we just would never see and we'd never be able to analyse just by looking at the plant, so we have to be confident about asking the questions and try to get to know the reputation and the style of the local grower and there's lots of ways you can do that. You can see if those folks are involved in the local gardening community, are they talking about these issues, are they trying to create the conversation around these exact topics that are very important, or are they trying to kind of not talk about those things too much. So, there's lots of little clues but it's important to ask questions because there's not going to be a visual reference or any kind of signage at a garden centre really likely to give you the full answer.

Jane: Let's just backtrack and just explain to anyone who's not fully aware what neonicotinoids are. These are systemic insecticides which are used, have been used on plants very widely, so rather than just acting at the point of the leaf or stem, they're going into the root system and the vascular system of the plant and acting from within. And these have been linked with declining bee populations haven't they, so not something that those of us who are trying to garden sustainably would be endorsing I suspect, to say the least.

Dave: That's kind of it, and I think it's interesting because I hear of various aspects of this conversation all the time, and so some people will say, "Well you know but my rubber tree, which is going to be in my office, is never going to be exposed to a bee, so what's the big deal?" And behind the scenes that plant may have been growing at a nursery that has an outdoor production facility where plants are regularly in the vicinity of bees and so which application of this style of insecticide which is very long lived within the tissues of that plant. It is known through science for sure at this point that is impacting bees, so we have to think of the bigger context, so it's not just about where that plant is going to end up in your home or office, or never going to be outdoors when you ultimately grow it on, but where did that plant come from and how is that affecting someone else's ecosystem in someone else's backyard because sometimes we forget that this is a very global thing and so it's not just about how it's affecting our home our office our neighbourhood, but how it's affecting the grower somewhere else and their local communities.

Jane: I think you could be sure if a plant doesn't say anything about neonics then, you know if a plant is neonicotinoid free, I'm sure that the supplier or grower will be shouting about it. If there's no mention of it, I think that's probably a possible indication that your plant has been treated with these systemic insecticides.

Dave: It's pretty common.

Jane: I know here in the UK there's a lot of pressure, consumer pressure, and government pressure to stop companies from using these on plants. So, it is starting to change. But that's a really, really good point as you say; just because you're plant isn't going to be into contact with bees we've got to think about the wider picture. And I guess this, maybe this fever for a lot of tropical plants is something that it's worth kind of thinking about in this context because while it's lovely to go and pick up, go to a big box store and pick up a really cheap Philodendron or rubber plant, if it were laid out for you what that plant's been through and where it's been and the miles involved, maybe you'd feel a bit differently about that plant. I think there's,, oftentimes I think there's that veil between us and what's happened to the things that we buy, that when it's lifted, we're a bit horrified.

Dave: Yes. I have this fantasy about having a podcast or a TV show or something where we just got to any given store and we just sort of take our camera and look at a product and then we get to go and trace its origin. Everything in the modern western world it really has a long journey to get to the shelf and we often forget about that and it is important to consider for sure.

Jane: I guess this is where kind of disrupting this, gosh I'm getting all sort of political here, but disrupting the system is kind of powerful in that obviously independent growers like yourself are doing amazing work in terms of providing a totally different ethos around the plants that you're producing. And also as houseplant growers, lots of houseplant growers are using the internet to swap and propagate and sell plants to each other that hopefully will be slightly more sustainable than a plant that's coming from a big box store. I guess it's never going to stop the amount of plants that we're all buying, but at the same time, the more people know about propagation the more hopefully plants can spread in a different way.

Dave: Yeah, I mean it's exciting to get those mail order plants but at the same time its very exciting to go to your local horticultural society garden swap and there's more and more interesting varieties available. The one thing that I always am amazed by, I live in the middle of Canada, in the middle of the prairies in a medium sized city, and I always figure that particular plants would just never be occurring here in someone's collection, and then I find someone who's got the rarest of rare plants and I just realize that there is a tremendous amount of plant material already close at hand. And a lot of the times the folks who have the very interesting and rare and collectable type things are passionate to the point where they like to share them and share the idea that they've got this special plant and they've got special knowledge that they can pass along to you might want to trade for. So yeah, the first place I would always look for a plant on your wish list is close to home, at garden clubs, at local horticultural societies, at local online forums, and specialty collector groups because it's often right here.

Jane: Yeah, that's so true. And there's nothing more satisfying than propagating a plant after all, that is the most satisfying thing.

Dave: Oh yeah.

Jane: But I guess we have to reflect on the fact that people are not going to stop buying plants from these big companies. So, what as consumers do you think we can do? Is it really a question of asking those questions when we're in that store and making every level of that organization aware of the fact that we want to know this information? Or is there anything more we can be doing to kind of pressurize big sellers to get with the sustainability issues?

Dave: Yeah this is a complicated one as someone who's in business selling plants I've often felt this tension between my need to support my livelihood by selling stuff and at the same time be true to my values and make sure that we're always kind of asking ourselves the tough questions so we can always be going forward authentically. So then I wonder as a consumer coming to any kind of a business, how do we demand more from businesses without just kind of giving up or feeling hopeless or losing the fun of all we're passionate about, and so when it comes to plants, we want to keep this fun and exciting and hopeful and all those good reasons we like to grow stuff. So, what do we do? I believe the government could actually be a little bit more involved in regulating pesticides, and some of the large, large companies that are behind things like the neonics sort of the mainstreaming, the absolute mainstreaming of the chemical approach to growing. As much as global warming and all the issues associated with sustainability are really gaining momentum right now and even younger and younger generations are leading the way on this, I think that in the bigger picture of the industry, which is such a large thing, it's being controlled by literally companies that don't want to change. They have a large interest in maintaining that chemical status quo and finding new ones and finding ways to present a different light on those chemicals, but at the end of the day we can do things differently and that's one of the things that excites me that there's always a solution.

So we come to hear that "We have to use to neonics because it's a safer way to control aphids versus the old style of spraying" and so some growers just acquiesce and say that's how it is and so some home consumers will say "Well I don't want aphids either so I can accept that," but the exciting part is that there are better ways of doing things. There's always new ways of doing things, and one of the passions I have found is just realizing how much more easy it is to grow plants with just a living soil organic approach because you build a lot of the resilience and immunity into the plant through the soil and this is very much supported by science. So it's sort of like a reframing because there's the mainstream and what we hear all the time, and then there's sort of these little things that happen out there and they gain some momentum but there's significant momentum now to the idea of understanding how an organic approach could actually maybe transcend the chemical approach. And as that starts to shift, I think home gardeners can legitimately ask for better and better quality, new ways of doing things. And I really think it has to be a question of petitioning governments around chemical control, I think asking at the consumer level, continuing to do those plant swaps rather than buys at nurseries if they're not going to cooperate. There's lots of things you can do. If you work in the industry, talk to your bosses. I know lots of local, other garden centre participants, employees at garden centres who come and talk to us at Sage because they want to have a conversation with their grower or their employer about how they could do things more sustainably, how they can affect change. And as they are able to demonstrate the value of doing things in a different way, and how different audiences are more in tune and wanting these changed methods, then things actually do start to become different.

Jane: So, tell me your sort of check-list of things that you've changed, or ways that you've become sustainable. We've talked a bit about peat, we've talked a bit about neonics. What are the other elements in the jigsaw that come together to make your business as sustainable as possible?

Dave: For sure. Well, I'm going to start at the very beginning and say that the first things that came to mind were obviously like pest management, the heavy-duty chemicals involved in that, that was easy to check off. There's lots of solutions when it comes to biological pest management and just different kinds of grower practices and diligence that will allow you to not have to use any can heavy-handed chemicals, so that was almost an easy one. Then the second thing was finding a good solution for a healthy nutrient system on a larger scale, so how could we find a compost based organic soil mix and fertilizer program that would be scalable so that on a commercial level we can actually afford to do this and offer the plants at a reasonable cost. So that was, that took a while, but after some time, after maybe about five or six years of being in business we were able to find a great solution for that, and that's just become better and better and better over time.

And then we started to really look at ok we're in a very cold climate and we have to do a lot of heating, so could be improve upon that? If we're going to do local growing, is it better to just source plants from somewhere else and just have them trucked in, or is it better to invest in the natural gas, in the propane that we were using? And we decided that we could do much better on that front and we invested in a geothermal heating system, which means that we're not using any carbon for that portion of our heating system. It's just all heat that is being pulled from the ground and the other benefit to that, and we sometimes don't think of this in a cold climate but cooling a greenhouse is also hugely energy intensive. So, with a geothermal system we're able to both heat and cool in a much more efficient way and not using the propane and natural gas to the extent that we were before. So that was actually a pretty innovative one, I can't think of any other local commercial garden centre that has gone down that avenue, so that's exciting.

About five or six years ago we started doing something called Naturescape Training with our staff. And what naturescaping is, is a way of looking at your plant relationships way beyond sort of organic but thinking about the ecosystem approach. And as much as this sounds like a very outdoor approach, you can even think about this with your indoor plants and the ecosystem that occurs in the soil and some of the beneficial insects that might be indoors, like spiders and even lady beetles and things like that, to be very helpful, and look at ways to create healthy habitats,. So those supporting microorganisms and beneficials will be able to thrive in relationship with your plants which once again just makes your job as a gardener, as a grower a lot easier. So, we really started to think about that as sort of an indoor and outdoor education point, both for ourselves and also in our conversations with our customers.

Another huge thing was as a business, we felt really disgusted honestly by the amount of waste involved, in terms of packaging, and in terms of the cardboard that all the plants arrive in, and all the pallets and the plastic wrap. We started to really be very aware and audit how we were managing that, and being sure that when we recycled things, we were putting them in a recycling program that would actually end up having the items be recycled as opposed to going to a landfill, making sure that all of our cardboard was going into the recycling. We participated in a closed loop plastic pot recycling program where the containers went back to the manufacturer and were turned back into new pots, so we really looked at that. Unfortunately, recycling has become a really challenging point as a lot of the nursery plastics are no longer recyclable, or there's very few programs that will actually accept them. And so, for going forward into 2020, and I think this will be a huge sort of change over the next couple of years globally, is we're actually abandoning plastic pots in favour of a wood fibre type, essentially a kind of paper pot that we're going to be replacing. And when it comes to houseplants, this is an interesting one because houseplants are typically grown for a longer period of time and they're also, they need to be presented quite nicely in the garden centre. So, it's taken a little bit of effort to find a non-plastic container that's going to make sense for houseplants, but I think we've got a solution for 2020 and we're very excited about that.

Jane: I wish you were in my neighbourhood Dave you sound great, and I think it's awesome that all the things that you're doing to try to make your business sustainable. And presumably, after 22 years, you're still going, so that must mean that it's, if not highly profitable, then at least enough to keep you in a reasonable income.

Dave: Well you know, thank you for asking, because that's actually a little bit the hardship of being a leader sometimes, but I can think back to conversations we've had with suppliers, and colleagues in industries and said, "Well, you guys are crazy, why would you bother doing those things?" But I think where it's left us after 22 years is in a position where people do recognize our long term commitment to these things and not just sort of jumping in as we hear about different buzzwords. And I think people do consider that we are being mindful and try to deeply think about how we could be a better business and a better part of the green industry, and that feels good. So are much as it's been maybe a bit of a slower road, and there's times where we felt we've had to make choices where... I'll give you a really good example actually.

Citrus plants in our area, in Canada most citrus plants are brought into the US and they're grafted in either California, Texas, or Florida, but there's very, very strict rules in the US by the EPA that require that these plants be treated by neonics, and since we don't deal in any plants that have been at any point treated by neonics, we just can't sell citrus plants anymore. That has been a hardship sometimes because people come and they would love to have citrus plants, and everyone loves to have the potted citrus plants and they see them everywhere else and they haven't necessarily got any clue that there's this rule that these plants be treated in such a way that they're going to have the neonics in them. And so, we've had to give up that part of our revenue stream, but that's ok. I think once we start to have those conversations with people and they understand why we've made that change and once we start to look at different ways that maybe we could grow citrus in house from cuttings and do our own kind of production maybe, going forward we have our own solutions, it just didn't really matter. So that's the thing, is to remain very true to your goals and to try to be a little bit all in. I think this is a topic where it's important to not just be a little bit here and there, I think you want to kind of go as deep as you possibly can.

Jane: I think the, going back to the point about waste and plastic waste, I think that's a real hidden but serious issue. If you go to any of the flower shows here in the UK, there's always a bit around the back where there's just huge amounts of waste and it just makes me want to cry.

Dave: Yeah.

Jane: And ever if you get plants delivered, I recently just got a wonderful delivery after I did an episode on the strawberry saxifrage, Saxifraga stolonifera. I inevitably, as always happens, ended up buying some more cultivars that I didn't have from a nursery here in the UK, mail order, and I was so happy when it turned up because it turned up in a cardboard box, and I opened it up, and it was filled with straw. And the plants were packed in straw and I was like 'That is just, I'm so happy now.'

Dave: That is wonderful news.

Jane: So, all the straw just went into my compost heap, cardboard box went into my compost heap, and there was a bit of tape, small bit of tape and that went into the bin. And that was it! And I was like, 'This is amazing,' I haven't got that big pile of plastic that normally comes out. But I guess, for bigger scale businesses, it's like moving a tanker. It's going to be a slower change. But we can do this can't we this? There must be alternatives and ways of recycling and finding compostable materials that we can use.

Dave: In a way, the biggest businesses could be the ones who make the greatest difference because if they can commit, they have the greatest resources to implement fairly quickly some of the alternatives. Then we larger scale change happen in a faster way. But in the meantime, for sure smaller businesses, niche businesses, I think it's a good opportunity for all of us who can be creative and can have those conversations directly with our customers, to make their day as this mail order nursery did when they made those very important choices to have a very sustainable mail order plant arrive at your doorstep. It's very impressive. I love the stride.

Jane; Yeah, it's great. I mean I've had a few different plants recently. I also had some plants delivered in those starchy peanut things, packing peanuts.

Dave: Yeah.

Jane: Which also just go on the compost heap, although actually I didn't put those, I actually put those away, because I thought 'I'm going to reuse those when I send somebody a plant.'

Dave: Definitely.

Jane; There are solutions. And I think as you said, companies can earn so many brownie points for embracing change and trying to make their plants more sustainable on the plastic. I mean I've got a heck of a lot of plastic pots which at all get reused many, many times and get given, you know I give a lot of plants away, I sell plants to make money for good causes and things so they're very useful. But I have been switching all my cacti and succulents over to terracotta pots. But when I'm doing that I was thinking, 'Gosh, I can see why terracotta is not great on a bigger scale,' because lovely though it is, it's so fragile, and you know I can see the downsides.

Dave: Oh yeah.

Jane: But I love growing stuff in terracotta, I find it absolutely brilliant for cacti and succulents particularly, and I guess we're going to be seeing a lot of different options coming on the market as alternatives to plastic pots.

Dave: In the last three years I'd say terracotta has been outselling our other kinds of plastic containers for houseplants for sure. People have been embracing it. It looks lovely, it fits in with so many different styles, and settings and of course, yeah, it comes from the earth.

Jane: Yeah, I absolutely love it. I run a Facebook group for my local area which is a kind of produce swapping and garden equipment swapping stuff, and I put out a call out saying "If anyone's got terracotta pots languishing in their sheds," so I'm gathering in more terracotta pots which is fantastic. So, it's been quite nice and it's a lovely experience and some of those terracotta pots are, I know, despite my clumsiness, are probably about 50 years old, and that's a wonderful thing to have a pot that's just been around for a really long time. Fingers crossed I don't break it of course.

Dave: Oh, the pressure's on.

Jane: Yeah, I know! And I'm really clumsy so it's not good, but I do try to take care of those terracotta pots because they are very special. It's really interesting to hear all these things that you're up to. Are there any issues that you've really come up against a brick wall, you just can't figure out a way to make a particular aspect of your business more sustainable than you've managed right now?

Dave: That's a great question. We're still working on the heating issue and a lot of people within the North American market would relate to the fact that part of the year it's going to be some pretty intensive energy use to grow the plants, so that's when even though we implemented this beautiful geothermal technology in our production greenhouse there. It was an expensive undertaking and that's got the longer-term kind of capital cost associated with the return on investment and all that complicated business stuff, but I would say that if we could have a better kind of growing system for the cold climates, environment where we do our greenhouse production, a lot of the greenhouse structure is available commercially for any kind of larger scale commercial facility are not particularly innovative when it comes to energy resourcefulness. Especially on the medium sized ones, once again very large growers might have the incredible budgets to build research quality greenhouses that have incredible insulation on the sides and everything, but for the average kind of garden centre owner you can't really invest in that. So, I would love to be able to have a better growing facility.

And one of the dilemmas we have is we still need to source plant material from all over the place. It is difficult to keep up with the ins and outs of what we would love to offer, when to get the volume of plant material sometimes to get us going we have to source it from Florida or somewhere quite far away from us, so we haven't been able to transcend that at this point in point. There are so many things that are only available from cuttings, we can't grow them from seeds. We have been working hard to source more certified organic material, when it comes to both cuttings and seeds and that's been very exciting because when we started into the certified organic sourcing it really was limited to herbs, veggies, and a smattering of maybe a couple of flowers. Nowadays we can actually source quite a few of our Perennials type things and some host plants as certified organic seeds, and that does make me feel really good because those growers are working hard to be great stewards of the land. And the more we support that, the more there will be availability of certified organic ornamental type stock material.

Jane: Yeah that is exciting. Change is a-coming, Dave! I'm very excited to talk to you about this and thank you very much for sharing your experiences, and let's hope that in the next five years we're going to see some amazing strides forward in this area, and thank you for being one of the people leading the way with this. It's fantastic to hear.

Dave: I really appreciate the opportunity to talk about this today. It is a passion and it is something that I'm very excited to know that more and more people are caring about and acting on so great, I really appreciate being a part of the conversation. Thank you.

[music]

Jane: Thanks to Dave, and do check out his podcast, The Grow Guide podcast, which has got some really interesting recent episodes including one on indoor composting which I've been listening to. I'll include all the details about Dave in the show notes at www.janeperrone.com. And now it's time for question of the week.

Paul from Australia got in touch with a question about Rhaphidophora tetrasperma - a plant that's often sold under loads of different names including Monstera minima, mini Monstera, Philodendron 'Ginny', and Philodendron 'Minima.' The actual proper Latin name is Rhaphidophora tetrasperma. It does however look a bit like a swiss cheese plant with dwarfed leaves. It's not actually that closely related to Monstera deliciosa, but it's a great plant if you happen to want that look of the monstera without the size. He says that "he's started seeing what he hopes to be variegation on his Rhaphidophora tetrasperma. It's early days, but I will be encouraging this to flourish. Any thoughts?"

So, Paul sent a couple of photos through and what he's seeing is a very small flash of a paler mint green colour in one of the leaves. So, what do we think? Does such a thing as a variegated Rhaphidophora tetrasperma even exist? Well, it does exist. Yes, there are very, very few plants around that are displaying this kind of variegation. There's a Youtuber called Legends of Monstera who has a video from the international aroid show earlier this month, which contains footage of a swap of a variegated tetrarsperma with a Monstera obliqua, can you believe that swap, and the variegated tetrasperma belonged to @PlantthatPlant, a guy named Oskar, who runs a rare aroid shop!? I think he's in Europe actually but certainly his shop ships in Europe and the US. So yes, this is possible that you have got a variegated tetrasperma. It's very rare thing. There are lots of pictures of this plant on @PlantthatPlant's feed. I have to say, it's not setting me on fire as a variegated plant. The variegation is what I would call, I think he calls it, what's the name he's called it, it's 'Mint Mini' I think he's' calling it, and it is a combination of plain great and a mint green, so it's not like an amazing pure bone white type variegation that you see on some variegated plants. it's quite subtle, but obviously it's rare, that's why people want it. So, what can we say about this? Well, I've had a few messages over the last few months from people who see tiny little areas of paler green on their leaves and assume that that means that they're getting some variegation.

First of all, I would say, the thing to remember about variegation of that this kind is that it's chimera variegation, so let's get into what chimera variegation is once more. Within the plant, cells with different genotypes, which means the genetic recipe of the plant, exist in one plant on tissues that're next to each other, but one layer of tissue will have one genotype, and the other layer of tissue will have another genotype. I'm going to post some links to explain this in more detail because it is getting kind of complicated to explain, but basically, the way you get variegation, depending on combination of genes you've got in those different layers, that affects how the leaf will look. So, you might see that there's a bit of variegation coming through in a leaf and it's just a very small amount of tissue that's affected, and that may happen on an individual leaf and not be repeated on any other leaves. Chimeral variegation is generally quite unstable, particularly the kind known as sectorial variegation because only half of each layer of cells is mutated, the other half remains in inverted commas, 'normal'. So that is very, very unstable, and I think that this is probably what you're seeing when you get a tiny little flash of a paler green. One segment of a layer of cells has mutated and is displaying this lighter colour because it's perhaps lacking chlorophyll, but the layers below contain chlorophyll so that's why the leaf doesn't appear white, it just appears a paler green. And it's worth bearing in mind that there are other reasons that paler areas on leaves might occur.

Pest damage is one thing to definitely check for. Spider mites can suck the sap out of leaves and make them look paler. You may have other pests that are damaging the leaf underneath and causing a different effect on the top which you may not have noticed. And the other cause of such mottling can be a virus that is affecting your plant. Particularly the mosaic virus or tobacco mosaic virus which does affect a wide arrange of plants and I'm seeing a lot of Monstera adansonii with this condition at the moment. How will you know that this is going on rather than variegation? Well the virus will reduce the vigorousness of the plant and will eventually kill it. So, if your plant is not putting out any new growth, and it has a mottled look, and the underside of the leaves -- the veins -- look really yellow, that could be the issue. Unfortunately, mosaic virus, well, there isn't any cure. So, if you think your plant's got this condition, immediately isolate it from all your other plants and keep an eye on it. The advice generally, is just remove and destroy that plant, but obviously, you might want to be absolutely sure that it is that virus, so separate your plant completely from every other plant you have and keep a very close eye on it and if it is mosaic virus, then I'm afraid that plant is headed for the bin. Don't add it to a compost pile because the virus can still spread that way.

Looking at your pictures, Paul, though, I think you've just got a very small amount of sectorial variegation going on. Keep an eye on your plant, and you never know! You may be lucky, and you may find that the plant starts producing much more variegation. You might want to try varying conditions to see what it's going to look like. You might want to try adding extra light or taking away light to see if that makes any difference. But really this is something that is out of your control. The plant will either stay plain green or it will become more variegated. I love Rhaphidophora tetrasperma and I'm not that bothered about the variegated form, so yeah, just try to enjoy the plant you've got and not worry too much. Obviously, it's lovely to have a plant that's worth thousands of pounds, or dollars, but really, I suspect that isn't going to be the fate of your plant in this case, Paul.

I will post the picture of Paul's leaf in the show notes and I would love to hear from any plant biologists out there, if I've got something wrong, if you've got something to add to this discussion, please do get in touch, because I'm only going on what I have gleaned from my research and I would love to hear from anyone who has specialist knowledge in this area so do get in touch. And also get in touch if you've got a question for On the Ledge podcast. is the place to come. I'll be teeing up a Q&A special some time before Christmas,, to answer a whole batch of your questions, so don't despair if your question hasn't been answered yet.

[music]

Jane: That's all for this week's show. I'll be back next Friday, so join me then for more foliage-based excitement. Bye!

[music]

Jane: The music you heard in this episode was Roll Jordan Roll by the Joy Drops, Quasi Motion by Kevin Macleod and Oh Mallory by Josh Woodward. The ad music was Whistling Rufus by the Heftone Banjo Orchestra. All tracks are licensed under Creative Commons. See www.janeperrone.com for details.

Subscribe to On The Ledge via Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Player FM, Stitcher, Overcast, RadioPublic and YouTube.

Dave Hanson’s business in centred around a sustainable approach to growing plants. Photograph: Sage Garden Greenhouses.

Sustainability could be described as the elephant in the room when it comes to the hype around houseplants. it’s a subject that’s really close to my heart, and one I am keen to explore through On The Ledge.

So I am tackling the subject head-on with an occasional series of episodes looking at different aspects of the subject: part one of the series, covering peat and peat-free compost, can be heard here.

This episode features a chat with Dave Hanson, owner/manager of Sage Garden Greenhouses in Winnipeg, Canada and co-host of podcast The Grow Guide, discussing sustainability and the houseplant nursery trade. We discuss the challenges of growing houseplants sustainability, and I find out what to look for and what questions to ask when it comes to sourcing houseplants that are as sustainable as possible. If you are interested in finding out more about rice hulls as a perlite substitute, I bought mine from eBay.co.uk and will be discussing this product in future episodes once I have had the chance to give it a trial.

Read my top ten tips for sustainable houseplants.

Listen to the other episodes in my sustainability series.

The mystery ‘Peperomia’ - unmasked!

Mystery peperomia update

If you’ve ever listened to one of those crime drama podcasts where you never actually find out whodunnit, you may have been wondering if our story about the mystery peperomia spotted by Charlotte in a Montreal cafe was going to end in a disappointing conclusion. You couldn’t be more wrong!

If you remember, Charlotte wanted help identifying a red-stemmed peperomia that looked like a Chinese money plant, Pilea peperomioides. We had various suggestions as to what the plant was, and a theory that it was a Pilea peperomioides that had been given extra carbon dioxide in the greenhouse but what we really needed was a picture of the plant.

A couple of listeners in Montreal volunteered to go and check it out, and after some hunting about - the plant wasn’t in the same spot - Clara emailed with a triumphant picture of the plant. I posted it on Facebook and  had some great responses but the conclusion was that it was indeed a Pilea peperomioides, but a plant that had been exposed to more light than usual.

Listener and biologist Leon Van Eck provided the proof we needed with an image of two Pileas from the same parent - one with red stems that had been in very bright light, and one with green colouration - see below. So it seems the red colouration is due to phenotypic variation caused by the environment, not a different form or cultivar. I am so glad we were able to solve this mystery, and special thanks to Clara for going on a special mission for On The Ledge, and to everyone who contributed suggestions!

Photograph: Leon Van Eck.

Paul’s Rhaphidophora tetrasperma: variegation, or something else?

Question of the week

Paul from Australia get in touch with a question about his Rhaphidophora tetrasperma: a plant that’s sold under loads of confusing names including Monstera minima, mini Monstera, Philodendron ‘Ginny’, and Philodendron ‘Minima’. He’s noticed a lighter area on one of the leaves, and wanted to know whether this really is variegation, and if so, how to encourage it.

Variegated Rhaphidophora tetrasperma do exist, but they are super-rare. I mention footage on the YouTube channel Legends of Monstera showing one being swapped with a Monstera obliqua (as in, a real one!) at an aroid show recently. The owner of the tetrapserma was @plantthatplant on Instagram, aka Oskar, who runs a rare aroid shop. You can see his ‘Mint Mini’ tetrapserma here.

I suggest that there are a few different reasons why leaves can exhibit these kind of patches, including pest damage and viruses. If the latter, plants will stop growing and will eventually die, so virus-infected plants should be removed and binned once an infection is strongly suspected.

But looking at Paul’s leaf, I suspect that this leaf is displaying a small amount of chimeral variegation, known as sectorial variegation - check out this link and this one for more of an in-depth explanation of the different types of chimeras.

Unfortunately sectorial chimeral variegation is inherently very unstable, so it may well be that it isn’t repeated on many if any further leaves. It’s worth changing the conditions of the plant and seeing how it responds. Good luck Paul!

Want to ask me a question? Email ontheledgepodcast@gmail.com. The more information you can include, the better - pictures of your plant, details of your location and how long you have had the plant are always useful to help solve your issue!

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HOW TO SUPPORT ON THE LEDGE

Contributions from On The Ledge listeners help to pay for all the things that have made the show possible over the last few years: equipment, travel expenses, editing, admin support and transcription.

Want to make a one-off donation? You can do that through my ko-fi.com page, or via Paypal.

Want to make a regular donation? Join the On The Ledge community on Patreon! Whether you can only spare a dollar or a pound, or want to make a bigger commitment, there’s something for you: see all the tiers and sign up for Patreon here.

• The Crazy Plant Person tier just gives you a warm fuzzy feeling of supporting the show you love.

• The Ledge End tier gives you access to two extra episodes a month, known as An Extra Leaf, as well as ad-free versions of the main podcast on weeks where there’s a paid advertising spot, and access to occasional patron-only Zoom sessions.

• My Superfan tier earns you a personal greeting from me in the mail including a limited edition postcard, as well as ad-free episodes.

If you like the idea of supporting On The Ledge on a regular basis but don't know what Patreon's all about, check out the FAQ here: if you still have questions, leave a comment or email me - ontheledgepodcast@gmail.com. If you're already supporting others via Patreon, just click here to set up your rewards!

If you prefer to support the show in other ways, please do go and rate and review On The Ledge on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher or wherever you listen. It's lovely to read your kind comments, and it really helps new listeners to find the show. You can also tweet or post about the show on social media - use #OnTheLedgePodcast so I’ll pick up on it!

CREDITS

This week's show featured the tracks Roll Jordan Roll by the Joy Drops, Quasi Motion by Kevin Macleod and Oh Mallory by Josh Woodward  Ad music was  Whistling Rufus by the Heftone Banjo Orchestra. All tracks are licensed under Creative Commons.

Logo design by Jacqueline Colley.