From the Fields - Tom Jopson

By Tom Jopson, Siskiyou County nursery producer

The confer nursery is in the season where we’re trying to set buds. For certain species, we do a “blackout” process to give them short days, the same as is done in floriculture. We give them a nine-hour day. That causes them to switch from growing in height to setting a terminal bud. It is mostly for Douglas fir, red fir and white fir. We are assessing where they are in their growth cycle. As they reach a target height, the blackouts supply four to six weeks of short days. If we black things out now, it means they are perfectly plantable by Oct. 1. If we have rain in southern Oregon during late September or early October, people will start planting certain varieties.

For the succulents, the challenge is matching supply with demand. We are constantly assessing the mother plants that we take cuttings from and root. We are looking four to six weeks in advance and figuring out how many we need to start to have the right material.

About three weeks ago, there was a fire here. At the closest point, it was 3 miles from the nursery. It expanded rapidly for a few days. Fortunately, we had wet thunderstorms and got half an inch to an inch of rain on the fire. We are on the other side of the valley, but half the valley’s residents were evacuated. We got lucky because it rained and the wind died for a couple of days. There were 3,300 firefighters here.

The big fire in the state now is the Park Fire that started in Chico. It did not burn through the forested area, but it burned through the grass and brushlands, which is part of the reason it moves so fast. Fires have driven our growth at the nursery for the past decade. Fortunately, the timber industry has responded, particularly Sierra Pacific, but all of them are already planning for reforestation the day a fire breaks.