User:Kaleswikiproject/Plant nursery

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Important Factors for Nursery Production:

For a nursery to produce healthy crops, they must manage factors such as irrigation, landscape topography, soil conditions of the site, and accessibility of machinery and employees, and careful plant species selection according to plant hardiness zone and environment the nursery is in.

Irrigation

Plants need water to grow. Water needs will vary depending on plant species, weather, and soil. An example is in Ontario, irrigation water is used most in late spring and in summer, when plants need water most, and based on climate patterns in Ontario, this time is also when there is the least amount of rainfall. Some nurseries will create water sources by building a dam, or changing a watercourse. or building manmade ponds. The water source and water pumps should to be close to fields In this situation, water will need testing for pH, and testing for chemicals in the water to ensure an acceptable water quality. Two common types of irrigation systems are drip irrigation, and overhead irrigation.

Landscape Topography

A good slope for a plant nursery is 1-2 degrees. Any more than 5 degrees will make the nursery susceptible to soil erosion. The nursery stock should be planted in rows running across the slopes. If the landscape of the nursery has sections of land where erosion could occur, the nursery needs to come up with a solution such as by using erosion prevention structures like rip rap. Topography impacts nursery design and layout and it is a factor in strategizing what direction to plant rows. It also impacts where windbreaks should be planted. If an area has a flat slope and is open, it will need a windbreak.

Soil Conditions

For a nursery to produce healthy crops, it will need to have healthy soil. The soil should have good drainage and nutrient holding capacity. Soil testing will help a nursery find out its pH levels, and also the amounts of nutrients in the soil. To test soil drainage, one method is to dig an 18" deep hole that is at least 4" in diameter. Fill the hole with water, and leave it for an hour. This will allow the soil to saturate. Next, fill the hole with water again but leave the top 2" of soil in the hole without water. Wait an hour then return to the hole with a measurement tool like a ruler to find out how much water has drained from the hole. The corresponding measurements will allow the tester to decide what type of drainage capacity their soil has. If the water level drops 1/2" or less it is poor draining. If water drops 1/2" to 1", it drains at a medium rate. 1"< means that the soil drains quickly.

Classification by Production System

Nursery plant material is sold using a variety of systems. The most common systems for woody plants are bare root, containers, and ball & burlap. There are manuals specifically for the production of bare root and containerized crops In North America, the American Standard for Nursery Stock (ANSI Z.60.1) and the Canadian nursery stock standard set specifications that determine what category of size a nursery plant material belongs. The categories relate to size of the plant, plant calliper and` height ratio, and the size of the root ball.

If plant stock is grown in a pot of any size or material, it is considered container grown plant stock. the benefits of using the system of container grown plant stock include the convenience of being able to maintain and transport the plant stock (find citation). However, container grown plant stock will develop poor root structure when the roots hit the side of the container and begin to circle. When the roots circle the pot, the plant is considered root bound. Container grown plant stock may be grown to size in the field and transplanted into a container, or grown in a container until marketable size if grown in container rather than a field, continual upsizing of pots will be important for preventing the plant becoming root bound . Some ways to prevent a crop from becoming root bound is by using air-pruning containers, which have spaces around the pot that expose growing media and roots to air. The air will stop the root tip from growing and circling the pot. Nurseries will also mechanically prune roots with "U" shaped or linear blades that are connected to tractors. Container production can be used for any plant species.

If a nursery plant is sold as "bare root", it means that soil has been removed from the roots, the product being sold is just the plant . Plants sold as bare root are marketed in the winter , to sell to customers in spring. Plants sold as bare root include herbaceous and woody perennial plants. Bare root plants are grown in the field during the growing season until they become a harvestable bare root crop. During dormancy, bare root plants are dug up, bundled, stored in a cool warehouse with roots in a moist media, they will be sold, transplanted back into the field in spring, or disposed of if there is not enough space in the field. The issue of being root bound is non existent for bare root plants because there is no container for the roots to circle around, bare root nursery stock has the standard of being free of root deformities, and being free of pests.

If a plant is ball and burlapped, it means the nursery dug around the plant with its soil while it's in the field and wrapped it in burlap which they tie down with rope. Nurseries may also use wire baskets to support the ball and burlap trees if needed. Ball and burlap trees loose close to 90% of their root systems when dug The size of the root ball of a ball and burlap tree depends on the calliper of the tree, and the species of the tree. Root balls must have the depth to keep most of the plant root system and also be deep enough to keep plant root ball intact while the plant is being moved or planted.

Edit summary:

Wire baskets are another type of growing system not included in the article.

Explainations of the bareroot and containerization systems. Include pot sizes for containers, include calliper size explaination for bare root.

Methods:

Propagation Nurseries produce new plants from seeds, cuttings, tissue culture, grafting, or division. The plants are then grown out to a salable size and either sold to other nurseries that may continue to grow the plants out in larger containers or field grow them to desired size. Propagation nurseries may also sell plant material large enough for retail sales and thus sale directly to retail nurseries or garden centers (which rarely propagated their own plants).

There are terms used to identify the stage that the nursery plants are at. Liners are young plants that are one or two years old. They may be sold as bare root or in containers. A whip is a tree with just a trunk and little to no branches. Whips can be grown from hardwood cuttings, seedlings, or propagated by budding, which is a method of grafting propagation where a single bud of a desired cultivar is grafted onto a rootstock plant. In the case of budding, the rootstock will be older than the crown.

A nursery must decide what plants they will grow

Nurseries grow plants in open fields, on container fields, in tunnels or greenhouses. In open fields, nurseries grow decorative trees, shrubs and herbaceous perennials. On a container field nurseries grow small trees, shrubs and herbaceous plants, usually destined for sales in garden centers. These have proper ventilation, sunlight etc. Plants may be grown by seeds, but the most common method is by planting cuttings, which can be taken from shoot tips or roots.

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