It’s 2025, and once again, it’s time to start planting for the new season. It’s been a great few days as we filled hanging baskets with dirt and watched the geranium, Mandeville, and fuchsia plugs arrive. Today we started planting. I love it!

Every year around this time, I find myself taking a trip down memory lane. My first spring in the greenhouse world was in 1994, and things looked a little different back then. Two things that stand out in my memory are how we filled pots and how we handled perennials. There was no pot-filling machine—every pot, tray, and hanging basket was filled by hand from large barrels of soil. It was a slow, labor-intensive process. My brothers and I would come in after school and compete with each other to see who could fill the most pots in an hour (if my memory serves me, I won the single hour “sprint” but not the shift “marathon”).

Then there was the challenge of space. Many of our greenhouses didn’t have enough room to keep the plants inside. We filled up old cow tanks with soil and planted in the greenhouse, but all the pots were lined up outside and given a gentle soaking of water. Some days were so cold that the top layer of soil froze before the plants were moved to a cold frame. Talk about numb fingers!

Fast forward to today, and we have warm greenhouses for nearly every step of the process. Our state-of-the-art bale shaver delivers soil to a hopper, which feeds into a conveyor belt that fills containers quickly and efficiently. It’s not fully automated, but the amount of time and effort we save is incredible. Some people asks if we ever raced the machine—like Little Jon and his hammer. No, we did not. The machine was way too fast.

Despite the many changes over the years, the excitement felt at the beginning of every season is still just as intense as always. For many of us, winter is just an inconvenient pause in our time spent in the gardens. More and more people are turning to houseplants to get through those cold months, but there’s still nothing quite like stepping outside, getting one’s hands in the soil, and feeling the promise of spring in the air.

Here’s to another season of growth, both in the garden and in the ways we continue to improve and adapt.

Have a fabulous day!

Jake

jmertins@ebertsgreenhouse.com