Happy Friday y'all!

We just hosted around 80 flower farmers from across the U.S. and even a few kind folks from Canada for a tour of the farm this Wednesday.  It was a beautiful morning with coffee and pastries from Comer Coffee and The Comerian, cooler temps, and a rapt audience.  A lot of the folks in attendance were our customers, some were our suppliers, others were beginning farmers, and some had operations that completely dwarfed ours.  Everybody was all smiles and pointed questions.  Such a different kind of tour than we've done in the past for students or guests.

Flower farmers chatting over coffee & pastries just before the tour began!

All the nitty gritty details of each crop, how and why we grow them, were eagerly dissected by people who had also grown them for years, or sometimes, decades. We thought it would be 1-2 hours, but ended up being 4 hours long and there was still so much more to talk about. You could spend multiple lifetimes trying to figure out being a farmer and still have more to learn.

Mandy & Steve took everyone on a tour around the farm, sharing what they have learned over the years and learning from the experiences of all the amazing growers that were here!

Afterward when most folks cleared out, a few farmers, some known for years, some just met, sat around the yard with us and our crew and chatted over beers and leftover pastries. It's in times like that when you remember that other folks are going through the exact same things you are, just with a slightly different face to them. There's always a collective sigh of release at that re-remembering. Knowing it and feeling it aren't quite the same. It's cathartic to feel it.

The education is a big deal, the connections made are helpful, and the emotional release of that experience of truly “getting” someone else is powerful.  For all these reasons I highly recommend flower farmers, and aspiring farmers, join ASCFG.  It's an amazing organization that changed our farm and our lives 14 years ago.  The people are great.  The information and education made available is priceless.  We can't sing its praises enough.

Mandy created this gorgeous arrangement of dahlias, foliage, and peppers growing around the farm!

One thing that seemed to fascinate our guests as much as it does us is the heat tolerant dahlias we're breeding. When seen next to our pre-existing favorites, it was clear which ones had fared better during this extreme heat of '26. We haven't been selling them as cut flowers because we still have to observe them fully and cull out the weak performers, but the first batch of beauties will be available to our flower customers next year. The tubers will likely be available to flower growers the following year. That said, if anybody knows of a tissue culture grower who wants to collab on developing cuttings for sale at a higher volume, do connect us. We'd love to get these genetics out on the market in greater numbers than we can achieve on our own, so y'all don't have to wait for years to get your hands on them.

Gathered around our dahlia field talking about irrigation, tubers, heat tolerant dahlia varieties, and more!

We've got cool nights and mornings now and threats of rain over the coming weekend. We'll keep hopes low for the latter (so they don't get dashed again), but we are appreciating starting work in the occasional long sleeves for an hour or two.

It's the last week of our Fall Plant Sale, and we're offering a discount to help you locals get these veggie plants in your fall gardens!  Get 15% off your order when you spend $35 or more on plants!  Place your order online, and you will select a time to pick up your plants at the Farm Store next week.  Speaking of the Farm Store, the store is full of dahlias this weekend.  Dahlia bunches are $15 each, and we're running a buy 2 dahlia bunches get 1 free sale in the store!

The mum moms are looking fantastic all lush and green, and the ones being grown for flower are budding up nicely.  The earliest varieties are actually showing some blooms, but our real harvests will start later in October and go through the week of Thanksgiving.

Mandy giving a disbudding demonstration in one of our heirloom mum tunnels (left) and leading the flower farmer group through the woods on our farm (right).

Steve pausing the group for a moment in the woods to talk about our love of growing and sharing Ice N' Roses hellebores!

We are grateful for these cooler temps. Each day in the fields and tunnels is met with much more comfort and enthusiasm. It's amazing what ten degrees can do for your motivation and enjoyment levels. The woods are calm and welcoming these last few weeks before the crack of deer rifles begin to sing out and introduce mild underlying concerns of a stray bullet while hiking through the woods or working in the flower fields surrounded by forest.

We'll make the most of this interim time and enjoy every pleasant hour of weather we get. Such a welcome change.

Wishing y'all a wonderful weekend.

Steve