The Vreugdenhil family has been grow without stilted fertilizers and chemicals for a while now . Recently , their potted plants have also been license by Skal . With the constitutional label , they hope to reach more consumers who really appreciate their instinctive way of doing thing .
After a course in land biological science , Johan Vreugdenhil realized that hokey fertilizers and chemicals are not the product that are producing the healthy and vital plants , but it is the healthy soil . " With schematic cultivation , it feel like you spray one job to death and get another in return . That ’s a spiral you ca n’t get out of . "
Resilient plantsThefamily business , which he run with his parents , brother and sister and which has been in beingness since 2001 , stopped using chemicals and later fertilizer in 2013 . " First , we still used industrial plant foil like sulfur and atomic number 29 , so everything that is also allowed in organic cultivation . strictly to supersede chemical products . But at some period , you number to realize that you desire to promote natural defenses . Nature has to do that for itself . So you have to intervene even less and pamper the plants less . "
From then on , the nursery mainly concentre on feeding soil life . Vreugdenhil : " grunge life in the end feeds the plants , give you goodish , resilient plants . That has really been the underlying idea , then you automatically start influence organically . "
Naturally StrongerHe calls it turn naturally . " But it ’s not nature . When you have a nursery , you have to produce . So you do need remark . We add constituent residual to feed the soil life . That soil life commute the substances into minerals that are absorbable by the plant in a healthy way . “That input consists of a wide kitchen range of mainly local residual current , such as mulch , compost , grass clippings from roadsides , and wood chip . Since 2018 , the family unit has been running the recording label Naturally Stronger . " What do we think is important about our plant ? Well , in the main that it is resilient , healthy , and grown naturally . of course , unattackable bear for our room of grow and our vision . "
Consumer marketAlthough their own plant have comply with constitutional certification regulation since 2015 , they have only now gotten endorse . Why ? Initially , they mainly grew hedge plants for the sweeping marketplace . nurseryman inquire for organic plants were few and far between . Later , they bulge out focusing more on the consumer market . " You need to extend consumers a gigantically wide range , which is why we started boom more and more , " he says .
WaiverFor a long time , they were clamber with the red tape and costs of documentation . " Because no organic starting stuff is arise for our merchandise , or hardly any , you have to apply for an granting immunity for many species . If you acquire a few hundred coinage , that ’s kick the bucket to be very expensive . We circularize some of it ourselves , but we raise more than 500 specie . It is not profitable to propagate everything ourselves . "
These exemptions are Department of Labor - intensive . " You have to substantiate well that there is no organic starting cloth uncommitted and why you require that picky product : is there no alternative ? Fortunately , because we were able to subject a joint list for the immunity , the costs were not too risky . "
2d - hand potsLess than 10 percent of the garden shopping centre ’s customers come for the organic reach , Vreugdenhil estimates . Their webshop Natuurlijk Sterker does focus on the sustainable client . You ca n’t just order everything there . " We pay attention to whether it can lick out economically and in terms of environmental impact because otherwise , it does n’t make much mother wit . We endeavor to make our business as sustainable as possible for a reason . For exemplar , we expend second - hand pots , so less energy is drop off . "
Even when pots are reuse , energy is needed to melt them down and plow them into new tummy . Vreugdenhil reuses pots from customers and other growers without rinsing them . Weeds or mould are not a problem ; soil biota takes caution of that itself and restores the balance .
Peat - free potting soilThey also make their own potting soil . " The potting soil you buy is often very uninspired . There is very little lifetime in it . To get a sizable industrial plant , you actually require grime life . We have now mostly move to peat - free potting soil , and the potting soil that still contains peat on has 15 percent peat in it . "
unconstipated potting ground lie in of at least 80 percent peat . " If peat is pull up , it is at the expense of nature . When it is applied in pot soil , the atomic number 6 stored in it decompose and releases CO2 . We work a idle plant back into a living works . From green compost and roadside clippings and leaves , we make pot soil again . From that , a new plant grows again ; this is how we essay to complete that cycle again . "
fortuitously , potting territory falls under the organic regulation . " That was a question mark beforehand : how will Skal deal with it ? Most of the grass comes from Staatsbosbeheer , but they are not Skal - certified . But you know they do n’t expend slurry or whatever , so that way of life , we could justify that this potting soil is organic . fortuitously , that means it abide by with Skal ’s rules . "
AppreciationIn late years , their plant , grown according to organic farming rules but not certified , went into the mainstream . " We hope that now that the industrial plant are Skal endorse , they more often end up with people who also apprise the way they were develop , " he says . He does see more attention being make up to the harm done by regular cultivation on the site itself . " The chemicals blow over and end up in control surface water . I hope it will start to sink in with masses that you do n’t require rest of chemicals in your own garden and - much more importantly - that in the culture cognitive process , price can occur to the environment , climate , and health . "
Source : Skal
