NOVEMBER 2018 • COUNTRY LIFE IN BC
37 Retirement blossoms into flower nursery
OK couple see room to grow local cut flower market
by MYRNA STARK LEADER KELOWNA – When Diane
Madden retired as a paralegal in 2014, she didn’t want to stop working. Neither did her husband, Kelowna landscaper Kelly Fix. Instead, they decided to tiptoe through the tulips to retirement, creating Casa Verde Flower Farm, an outdoor nursery on 5.5 rented acres in Kelowna’s Lower Mission neighbourhood. “In our late 50s, we wanted
to figure out what we could do as a transition into retirement. We were both feeling far too young to retire,” Madden says. “In the wintertime, when
we go for a walk, I could never hit 10,000 steps,” Fix adds, pointing to his Fitbit. “But three times this week I’ve hit 20,000 and haven’t even thought of it. It’s part of our lifestyle and how we want to stay healthy as we age.” The nursery, located in the
Agricultural Land Reserve, took some work to set up. Beginning in 2016, the couple began prepping the soil, controlling weeds and rediscovering the irrigation lines that draw water from an above-ground irrigation ditch. An acre of annuals was planted in 2017. This year, the planting increased to the full acreage, with conifer trees, upright juniper shrubs and perennials.
Renting was a more
affordable option for Casa Verde, given local land costs in the tens of thousands per acre. Their advantage is knowledge – of the climatic region, what local nurseries want, and through Fix’s landscaping experience, what people want.
Diane Madden and Kelly Fix are easing into retirement growing cut flowers and ornamental shrubs. MYRNA STARK LEADER PHOTOS
Their business plan includes about half a dozen short, medium and long-term plants. Their first planting included 300 landscape-style inland variety native Douglas fir, 300 concolor firs and 700 junipers of three varieties.
“They’re tall and look great in a smaller yard, slow growing, drought-tolerant and deer-resistant,” Fix explains. In the medium term, they’re
banking on perennials like See FLOWER on next page o
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