Dainty Miss
Dear readers,
Isn’t she beautiful, that little, proud ‘Dainty Miss’. She really is one of my favourite daffodils. Here’s what I’ve written about this marvellous little daffodil on our website:
What a cutie;
Flowers of the most beautiful beauty,
of the dearest love,
of the nicest nice,
of the whitest white,
and of the simplest simplicity
are shy about asking for attention.
Not many words are needed. As you can see, I am rather fond of Dainty Miss.
Sadly, it looks as though she is leaving home. She is moving to another flower bulb grower in Breezand. A bigger home, a wider view, a brighter future — you know the stories: the kids start to have a mind of their own once they’ve grown a bit.
Though I should admit that Dainty Miss was given a little encouragement to leave the nest. For many years she has been growing at Jan Hein’s nursery, where she has been raised with plenty of love and attention. She grew up beautifully, wanted for nothing, and year after year produced more than enough bulbs for the Fluwel webshop.
Daffodil Dainty Miss
To be fair, it wasn’t entirely Dainty Miss’s own idea to move out. For some time now, people had been looking at her sideways with an expression that said: “Isn’t it about time you found somewhere else to live?” She wasn’t exactly thrown out — it wasn’t that bad — but she could probably sense what was coming. The thing is, Jan Hein grows the larger quantities of Fluwel daffodils. More than half of all the daffodils we offer come from his nursery.
Jan Hein and Fluwel have a very good working relationship. Jan Hein grows top-quality daffodils for us, but as with any partnership, things don’t always go entirely smoothly. There are discussions, different ideas, disagreements and all sorts of other things. Why Jan Hein does this... No, wait, stop — I’m joking, of course. We have worked together wonderfully for years and there’s not a single thing to complain about.. The only tiny problem lies entirely with me, and that is my enthusiasm. Every year, I come up with a few new varieties to introduce to Jan Hein’s nursery so that he can grow them in sufficient quantities for them to be offered on the Fluwel website. Some varieties we deliberately keep small, growing no more than the market asks for. But there are also varieties we believe could do very well on a larger scale. Those varieties get bigger and bigger on Jan Hein’s nursery every year, and of course that cannot continue forever. Every now and then, the larger ones have to make room for some new residents. And this time, it was Dainty Miss' turn.
Last year, for exactly the same reason, we also had to say goodbye to another one of my favourite daffodils: ‘Tangerine Beauty’. She too has found a new home with a grower in Breezand.
Angel’s Breath also left our nursery some time ago and is now being grown on a large scale in ’t Zand
Say Cheese is another daffodil that went out into the big wide world. It was a heartbreaking moment when she was loaded up for transport and left our nursery. For many visitors – particularly women – she used to be the most popular little daffodil in our collection. Everyone who saw her had something sweet to say, wanted to give her a cuddle, and wanted to buy her. She is perfectly happy at her new nursery and is growing like mad. A good tip for my fellow flower bulb traders: ask about Say Cheese, because the grower still has bulbs available. Send a small sample to your customers or plant some in your display garden, and I am sure you will sell plenty of them. She’s also a top seller in the Fluwel online shop.
I really ought to wrap things up now. I need to go back to the shed and have a look, because the daffodils are being mixed these weeks and I like to be there when that happens. Yes, we make a lot of daffodil mixtures for our American customers. Daffodil mixtures are incredibly popular over there. So popular, in fact, that the majority of our daffodils sent to America go as mixtures. If Americans like pink daffodils, they preferably buy a mixture of pink daffodils. The same goes for double daffodils, split-corona daffodils, and other types.
Mixtures of fragrant daffodils, for example, are also incredibly popular there — and they are very well loved in our own webshop too. I can almost hear you thinking it, because I am asked this very often whenever I talk about mixtures: “What is your most popular mixture?”
Among the tulips, Tutti Tulpi is head and shoulders above the rest. I completely understand why. However loud and colourful it may look, I would buy it too.
Tutti Tulpi is a mixture of 50 tulip bulbs, and every single one is different. Fifty different tulip varieties together in one bag. We have been making it this way for years: 50 crates lined up in a row, each holding a different tulip, and then walking along them dropping the tulips into the bags one by one. For the romantics among us, there is also Tutti Tulpi Romantico, where we leave out the stronger, brighter colours.
Among the daffodils, our Fluwel Daffodil Mixture tops the list. For our loyal readers: this is the same mixture I wrote about two weeks ago. It was built from father Karel’s daffodil collection, which contained more than 2,000 varieties. Last year it only just missed out on first place, with slightly more Tutti Tulpi bags sold than Fluwel Daffodil Mixtures. Let’s hope they swap places this year.
Now I really am stopping. I’d better quickly go and check that they aren’t making a mixture of the mixtures while mixing the mixtures.
Kind regards, and see you next week,
Carlos van der Veek
