Movie Offers Galore, Midas Touch and Voodoo Thrive

The heat wave seems to have broken (I don’t want to speak too soon) so our high temperatures are in the mid-twenties, rather than the low thirties. People are beginning to worry that somehow we missed out on summer, and they’re wishing for the heat to come back.

Not Pedro and I. We are perfectly happy not having to worry about the high temperatures in our three Glasshouses. The sun still visits us, more often than not, but it doesn’t have that burning intensity that could be anathema for sensitive blooms, such as Roses.

The movie had its premiere in Toronto, and we were invited. Our Glasshouse Number Three looked especially wonderful up there on the wide screen and I got all nostalgic about our Ambience and Granada Roses.

I closed my eyes during the final scene, when the mad murderer takes a machete to the Roses, even though by this time the moviemakers had substituted silk and plastic flowers for the real ones.

The week after the premiere, Pedro received phone calls and e-mails from American and Canadian producers, wishing to use our Greenhouses as one of the locations for their next film.

Even though we got reimbursed handsomely for the experience, we hesitated to except any of the new offers, prior to seeing a script. We feel responsible to present Roses and Rose-growing in a good light.

As it worked out, most of the screenplays called for the destruction of the Roses and the Greenhouse itself, either through explosion, fire, or earthquake. Why do big budget movie producers insist on all this violence on the screen?

Pedro decided to turn down all the offers. “Dear Jill, our flowers need some peace and quiet now. It wouldn’t be fair to them to have all this noise and activity to disturb their natural production of beautiful blooms.”

I agreed with Pedro wholeheartedly. Although the money was tempting, we instead concentrated on growing the best possible cut flowers, using the expertly designed plant foods from Advanced Nutrients.

The Hybrid Tea Roses Midas Touch and Voodoo, our newcomers, are thriving on their diet of Iguana Juice Grow, along with the Plus Program of all the additives, supplements, and root colonizers.

They’re still in the vegetative stage, which means that they receive fundamental doses of Piranha, Tarantula, and Voodoo Juice, in order to populate their root systems with beneficial fungi, bacteria, and microbes, respectively.

Ever since I was a little girl, one of my favorite stories was the one about King Midas. It’s the ultimate “be careful what you wish for” story. Dionysus granted Midas one wish for a good deed, and the King wished that everything he touched should turn to gold.

And so it was. But the King grew thin, since every time he tried to eat, the food would turn to gold. He touched the beautiful Roses in his garden, and they turned to the yellow metal, as well.

He lovingly touched his daughter, and even she turned to gold. He became afraid that his whole kingdom would eventually turn to gold, so he asked Dionysus to turn everything back to the way it was.

So now we have a golden yellow Hybrid Tea Rose to commemorate the name of King Midas. The moral of his story is that real wealth cannot be measured in precious metals.

I can’t wait for the Midas Touch Rose to flower, so I can inhale its rich, fruity fragrance. In a way, all the ingredients that we mix into our nutrient solution are aimed at the arrival of that day, when the large, golden flowers will finally open.

Pedro is already spraying these Roses with Colossal Bud Blast, in anticipation of their flowering. This foliar spray can be used throughout the vegetative and bloom stages in order to provide the plants with the ability to absorb organic nutrients better.

Even though Colossal Bud Blast complements our feeding regimen rather nicely, it can also be used as a standalone product. It’s a complete blend of vital nutrients, plus natural biostimulants, chelators, and surfactants.

There is nothing else like it in the gardening marketplace, and it does provide us with a Midas touch when it comes to growing our flowers. It contains reduced nitrogen, in the form of amino acids, and reduced carbon, as carbohydrates.

During the bloom stage, we’ll be feeding our Roses not only with Iguana Juice Bloom, but also Carbo Load Powder, which will provide our plants with additional carbohydrates, to be used as building blocks for flower formation.

And even though Midas Touch Hybrid Tea Roses have good disease resistance, Pedro mixes in Barricade every week into the nutrient solution. He also makes sure that Glasshouse Number Three, Multi Rose, receives regular sprayings of Scorpion Juice and Protector, in order to keep parasitic fungi, bacteria, and viruses at bay.

Choosing Two New Roses, Filling Our Huge Reservoir

After the movie shoot, Pedro and I took all our Ambience and Granada roses to the Rose Auction here in Mississauga and managed to get premium prices for all of them. Buyers were impressed with the extra long stemmed beauties, making us think that perhaps we’ll make a “mistake” with Iguana Juice Grow once more in the future.

I was ready to bid for a batch of Granada rooted seedlings, when Pedro stopped me. “No, my dear Jill, there is a tradition in our family. When we harvest a greenhouse completely, not leaving a single rose, we have to choose new varieties.”

“But we were so lucky with our Ambience and Granada Hybrid Teas,” I protested. “It seems foolish not to grow the same variety again!.”

“Whether or not it seems foolish, we must respect family tradition,” said Pedro, and I melted with the sentiment that he included me in his family. After all, I’ve been waiting for him to ask me, but so far there are no marriage plans on the horizon.

So we looked around the auction, and ended up buying a batch of Hybrid Tea Rose Midas Touch, a hardy yellow variety, and another Hybrid Tea, Voodoo, an orange-red blend, a very dramatic mixture.

I questioned growing a yellow rose, since they’re not meant to be grown in cold climates. However, Pedro convinced me that in our climate control Glasshouse it doesn’t matter that we happen to be located in Canada.

Voodoo grows best in the cool of Spring and Fall, it doesn’t like hot, dry summers. “We’ll keep the temperature down and make sure that there’s adequate humidity,” said Pedro.

Voodoo’s parentage can be traced back to Camelot, First Prize, Typhoo Tea, and Lolita, and it was an American Rose Selection in 1986. Rose patents are only valid for 20 years, so we don’t have to pay royalties on this one.

Also possessing an expired patent, Midas Touch was an American Rose Selection in 1994, and it’s supposed to be easy to grow and tolerant of different climates. Both of our new varieties are disease resistant. Of the two, Midas Touch is the more prolific.

Pedro saw how sad I was saying goodbye to growing Granada and Ambience again, so he promised that after a year, we could go back to our original multi-hued selections. “The tradition allows going back, but only after a reasonable time.”

By that time I’ll be in love with Voodoo and Midas Touch and not ready to give them up, either. However, the seedlings were actually cuttings grafted onto disease resistant rootstocks, and they looked quite sturdy and full of healthy vigor.

“Were you serious about feeding them extra organic fertilizer to make their stems grow tall?” I asked Pedro. He said he would think about it, but that he doesn’t like the idea of the Roses growing too close to our High Pressure Sodium lighting fixtures.

We treated all our fledgling Roses with No Shock, in order to minimize the effects of being transplanted. We placed them in the coco coir medium in our multi-bucket hydroponic ebb and flow system, and Pedro mixed up the first batch of nutrient solution for the young newcomers.

Don’t forget that our Glasshouses are huge (125 feet by 40 feet) and that our 2000 bucket ebb and flow system covers 5000 square feet in each greenhouse. Each bucket is fertigated by our ebb and flow system with 2 gallons of nutrient solution four times a day, then the liquid retreats into our 5000 gallon reservoir.

The Advanced Nutrients Nutrient Calculator calls for 19.8 Liters of Iguana Juice Grow to be poured into our pre-mix tank, along with 14.1 Liters each of Humic Acid and Fulvic Acid, 5677.53 mL of Carbo Load Liquid, 46.7 Liters of SensiZym.

Week 1 calls for 17 Kilos each of Piranha, and Tarantula, as well as 25.5 Liters of Voodoo Juice. We also have to pour in 31.2 Liters of Seaweed Extract along with the same amount of Organic B. Didn’t I tell you that Advanced Nutrients products are delivered to us by the truckload?

But we have our prize=winning Roses to show for it!