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  General manager Keith Francis said a greenhouse retrofit was a cost benefit and allowed production to begin much sooner than building new. | |||||
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By Kelli Rodda The first day general manager Keith Francis showed up to run newly formed Gilroy Young Plants, fresh cut roses were still being harvested from the facility. The start-up bedding plant producer purchased a cut-rose facility in Gilroy, Calif., and allowed the former owner to liquidate his remaining stock. Gilroy Young Plants chose to retrofit an existing facility because land costs and the state's permitting process made it prohibitive to start from the ground up. "California is not antigrowth, but the permitting process is slow and cumbersome," Francis said. "And for all the facets of this facility -- building on bare land and getting permits for water, runoff and environmental issues -- the retrofit was the best plan because of the cost benefits and because we could get the plants grown quickly." Gilroy Young Plants acquired a 100,000-square-foot glass house and approximately 3 acres of poly houses to work with. The transition was not without its obstacles. For bedding plant production, Francis and his crew needed more space for carts, trucks and benches. The facility was not set up to handle the volume of bedding plants they wanted to produce. "There were solid dirt floors and all of the production and material came to a central location," Francis said. "It was enough room for him (the rose grower) because his material gets smaller and smaller as it finishes production. We needed concrete floors and enough room to take material from the bench to the racks to the trucks, as well as a place to store the racks." In with the old, in with the new Sanitation was another major issue for Gilroy Young Plants. One of the biggest feats was preparing the glass house for bedding plants. "We had to concentrate on outdoor weed and insect control, which isn't so much of an issue with cut roses," Francis said. The general setup of the glass house gave the company a good sounding board for its new operation. "Things like the cooling fans and pads, shade systems and vents pretty much worked for us, but we added heat, circulation fans, concrete, benches and a high-volume irrigation system," Francis said. The glass house was equipped with top vents, but side vents, as well as some automated curtains were installed in the south range. The rose grower used a low-volume drip system, but Gilroy was able to use some of the irrigation infrastructure. "We tried to use as much of the old system as possible so we wouldn't have to replace some of the valves and other components, but now some of the seals are starting to go. In retrospect, maybe we should have gutted the irrigation system and started over," he said. But using some the existing components allowed Gilroy to begin production quickly and cut down on some initial costs. Gilroy is using a Netafim upright irrigation system moving through PVC along the benches. Francis plans to upgrade the environmental controls and add more fertilizer injector systems. He also hoped to upgrade the pad system to be fully automatic by mid-July. Level headed Gilroy needed to modify the benches and recruited Conley's North for the job. Francis contemplated no benches to rolling benches, but Steve Leitzel, general manager of Conley's North, helped him create a solution. The existing benches sloped 1 foot or more on each side toward the center, Leitzel said. The Conley's team designed an adjustable custom bracket that attaches to the concrete floor, making the benches level. Each bench has a walk aisle along each side. Benches also match up with the width of the building and accommodate pots from 105 liner cells up to pot trays, Francis said. "That took some work, but for the most part they're an excellent fit," he said. "We still don't use every aspect of the benches yet, but we will as production grows." The glass house holds eight benches that are 115 feet long. Two benches measure 48 inches wide and the rest are 68 inches wide. Leitzel and his team beefed up the bench heat that was originally set up to bottom-heat the roses. "It was pretty crude because it was undersized with a small-diameter pipe. But we kept that and added 16 Modine supplemental air heaters at 400,000 Btu each," Leitzel said. Conley's also eliminated some columns in the glass house and added I-beams to create more room to move the product, Leitzel said. "It was a tough retrofit because of the floor situation, but they saved a ton of money doing it that way," Leitzel said. Conley's also built 2 acres of shade structure for the operation. Learning curve Francis and his staff started production in June 2000, and they're still tweaking the growing system in the glass house. "It's a learning curve because the glass has different characteristics," Francis said. "The plants seem to grow a little softer, even though we can cool with fans and pads, but we definitely have more control in the glass house." The glass house is "very bright" and quite different from growing under double poly without shade, he said. Gilroy replaced some of the glass with new tempered glass. And, depending on the crop, existing shade curtains and/or whitewash are used. "We're growing crops that can handle some of the higher light better, and we have good air circulation up on the benches," he said. "We have enough air movement to get better control of air and light cycles, and I definitely wouldn't trade that for having low light." Crops grown Gilroy Young Plants is a young plant and bedding plant producer, as well as a rooting station for Goldsmith verbena. Previously Gilroy grew New Guinea impatiens for Fischer USA. Gilroy is a division of Kawahara Nursery in Morgan Hill, Calif.
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