ABOUT FLORAL ENCOUNTERS

We just LOVE plants!

We lovingly tend them on our organic farm in central New Jersey that we started from scratch in 2007 with a staff of two. Originally we grew on only one acre but that has increased to nearly 7 acres. Not all of that is tended fields some is orchard, some forest and some more like a small arboretum containing a variety of awesome trees that we have grown from seed or small plants over the years.

We started by growing mostly medicinal herbs as we feel that alternative health is important for everyone and being able to grow your own medicine is important. However as environmental issues have developed we have added many plants to encourage pollinators in the way of bumble bees, native sweat bees and other insects that pollinate. Fortunately many of these are also medicinal plants so our goals meshed beautifully, but others are just so beloved by pollinators or have such beautiful flowers we added them anyway.

The insect populations on our farm exploded. When we began there were very few now our field rows are buzzing with all kinds of pollinators and a large array of butterflies, far more than are often found in butterfly gardens. We are now a designated insect sanctuary and part of the Home Grown National Parks network. Our head farmer is also a qualified Environmental Steward and we work as much as possible to follow these practices. We consider ourselves as stewards of this land trying to improve it and provide a much better environment for the animals and plants that live here.

More recently trees have become a very important factor in everyone's lives. Growing more trees is important to help save our planet and we can all do our part. So our little arboretum initially grown because we just liked the beauty of the trees has now become an important factor in our farm. We now collect seeds from these trees along with many other trees on our farm and forage for others in wild areas around us. These we now offer so others can grow beautiful trees to shade their houses, gardens and help save the planet.

We believe that seeds are important and that they should be treated with love and care. All our seeds are loving grown, harvested and stored in our specially designed seed store to ensure they are kept in the best condition until they are sent out to customers. We take care when we ship seeds so they spend as little time in transit as possible especially in hotter months which is often not the best for many seeds.

All our plants are grown using organic methods and practices. The main difference from regular organic farming is that we use NO CHEMICALS AT ALL! No pesticides, herbicides, insecticides only fertilizer from organic sources. All our plants are grown using low water drip irrigation systems with protective plastic mulch which ensures that water stays in the ground, reduces weeds and more importantly keeps plants clean and free of any soil pests and bacteria. This method is actually required by many medicinal herb supplement companies to ensure that plant material is clean and pest free.

Almost all the work on the farm is done by hand. A small tractor is used to do the initial preparation of the fields but after that its manual labor, adding new mulch, planting, tending and harvesting. Our staff has grown from the original two and fluctuates during the year depending on season.

Our mission has changed over the years but the underlying premise is still the same. Offer the best possible organic seeds so others can grow their own plants and improve their lives. This evolved into improving everyone's lives by helping to save the pollinators and grow trees to help save the planet.

We are delighted with how much the land we tend has flourished under our stewardship and encourage everyone to use their own gardens to produce productive environments to help themselves, pollinators and everyone else by helping to save the planet one small plot at a time.

See farm images for more photos of the farm.
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