Episode #12, Niche Family Farmers Cash in With Canna Lilies

03/11/18 • 25 min

Last summer my friend and I sold potted canna lilies very successful at the farmers market. The crowds literally gravitated to our pots of gigantic leaves and bright red flowers, and they sold out every week. There is no other flowering plant that is so mesmerizing and so easy to grow in most conditions. This is episode 12 of the Get In My Garden Podcast, and I’m Aaron Moskowitz. My guest today is Nikki Snow of Horn Canna Farm which she runs with her husband Dustin. Nikki loves people, animals and plants, and she is the type of person who instantly make friends with her customers. The farm has been in the family for 90 years and now does much of their business online through their website cannas.net. Canna Lilies are a classic garden and landscaping plant with dramatic and fast growing foliage that can grow as high as 8 feet tall, depending on the variety you choose, and they flower consistently through the summer and early fall, They have various shapes and many colors from dark reds, pinks, yellows, oranges, whites, plus so many interesting mixtures of these colors. Their huge and striking leave are similar to their cousin, the banana plant, and they come in very interesting colors and patterns including colorful stripes. I was drawn to the story of how this small family business started with selling vegetables at the market, and evolved over the years into a well-established niche farm business known throughout the country. Each generation focussed on something different and faced different challenges, even near catastrophe, yet today they are still focussed, evolving, growing and thriving. We discuss their farm operation, many interesting details about canna lilies, how to grow them, and the scope of their canna lily collection which you can see more of on their website.

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Episode #11, Snail Farming Opportunities and Challenges

This is the snail farming episode where I share some of the very interesting facts I’ve learned about snails as food, rules about snail farming in the United States, plus snails as the subjects of research and as ingredients in miraculous health products. Snail farming, aka heliciculture, has a long history going back thousands of years. The business opportunities today are real, and small farmers around the world are starting to notice. Snails are a sustainable protein, very much bioavailable to humans and with anti-inflammatory properties.

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Episode #13, Orchid Obsession Turns Profitable

On today’s episode, we meet Kelly McCracken, orchid aficionado and owner of High Desert Orchids located in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Her specialty orchid business is marketed only on social media, namely facebook, and has grown exponentially, with no advertising expenses what so ever. She has literally turned her hobby and passion for miniature orchids into a thriving backyard business. Kelly and her orchids are the epitome of the modern home business created with limited capital, leveraging social media and then growing and serving her niche community. She will share her clever and highly successful model of selling her plant inventory via facebook live while creating an engaging, fun and educational sales environment. She shares her story, details about the massive variety of orchids available and some of the history of commercial orchids being sold in the United States. Visit High Desert Orchids on facebook to see all the amazing small orchids she sells and to participate in her facebook live sales. I hope you enjoy our interview.