Belle Fleur Gardens
by Stuart Brown
With the closure of Belle Fleur Gardens I took the opportunity to speak to Walter and Kit Jack about their beginnings.
Belle Fleur was established at Northope in Central Southland by Walter and Kathleen (Kit) Jack in 1976. The gardens included many of the latest award winning releases from America, Britain, Australia and New Zealand. Exhibition, cut flower and garden cultivars.
The Jacks who had been growing dahlias off and on for a few years were giving their tubers away, most of the time to complete strangers. This prompted them to go commercial with their operation. The neighbour's teenage daughter was taking French at school and suggested the name "Belle Fleur". They had thought of Oreti after the local river but there was already a tree nursery in the area (Oreti Nursery). Belle Fleur was chosen. They did however opt for Oreti as the prefix for their own raisings.
During their years with Belle Fleur Gardens Walter and Kit gained a reputation worldwide. They were out there at every opportunity actively promoting the dahlia. This was more than just a business venture but a pure love of a job.
They tried most forms of advertising: radio, local television, NZ wide through daily newspapers, they tried the lot. Most were ineffective. All advertising was expensive and quite often the results did not cover the costs. The "NZ Gardener" magazine gave the best results but they found the best of all was "word of mouth".
Late February each year the Jacks would make the 200 kilometre trip north to the Dunedin House and Garden Show. This was another way of putting their dahlia business before the public. It proved very profitable and generated ongoing business throughout the year. They never went any further north than Dunedin for trade shows but attended local flower or craft shows setting up display stands. They were also frequent guest speakers for garden clubs and leisure groups and would take along flowers in the summer, slides during the winter and tubers in the spring.
Belle Fleur dealt mostly in pot tubers. Walter and Kit found them a good method of knowing how many orders one could take on any particular cultivar and found them easier to keep healthy than a cut tuber. They were more reliable to grow, great for packing and posting and much easier getting clearance for export than a cut tuber.
The bold colours in smaller flowering varieties always sold whether they were exhibition or garden cultivars. Good exhibition smalls are also some of the best for cut flower. Dwarf and border dahlias however did make up probably a third of the Belle Fleur sales.
The Jacks have found that todays dahlias have improved so much in stem, colour and form since they first began growing them. Walter has a liking for mediums to giants and when they first grew 'Pink Jupiter' in 1982 he knew they had something very special. This along with 'Daleko Jupiter' and 'Rose Jupiter' are for him the most rewarding to grow.
The most memorable dahlias for Kit would be 'Longwood Dainty', which she considers still as popular today as back in the 1980's, and the SSC 'Worton Blue Streak' and Waterlily 'Lauren Michelle' The latter two were popular colours (lavenders and purples) no matter what colour was in vogue. She believed that you really had to be up to date with the current trend in colour fashion and that did tend to have a bearing on what customers were swayed to for that year. Although lavenders, pinks and purples were always popular she said.
The number of tuber orders would vary from year to year. In the early days of Belle Fleur there would be 200-300 orders each year. This grew to around 1,000 in more recent years. Overseas orders were often bulk orders to dahlia groups with several growers per order. They had a good client base in America and South Africa and also regularly sent tubers to Canada and the United Kingdom. With very expensive quarantine costs the Australian growers would rally together every 5 or 6 years and place a large order sharing the costs. Tubers were also sent to New Caledonia and France. Around 15 to 20% each year would go on exports.
Walter and Kit enlisted the help of a lady from early July to mid December to assist with potting, planting and preparing orders for packing and posting. More recently they employed a youth as well for the same period to help with cuttings, rotary hoeing and planting. This was where the current owner, Paul Fieten, came onto the scene.
Belle Fleur Gardens imported dahlias into the country as well. These were usually ones that Walter and Kit had read about or had been offered by their many overseas contacts. New Zealand growers relied on Belle Fleur for new cultivars although there were a few North Island growers bringing new stock into the country. The Jacks normally grew them for a few years before giving them "the thumbs up or thumbs down".
Due to the tight import regulations it is much more difficult to get new cultivars from overseas than it used to be. Overseas nurseries were also finding it more difficult to get a clearance for export. Walter believes it is important for NZ growers that they foster the raising of quality new cultivars, ensure that the trials are well managed and that the National Society educates its growers in healthy growing so that they do not have a rapid break down on their top dahlia varieties. New Zealand is an isolated country and has become more self reliant on their own raisings. We have been fortunate over the latter years to have many quality NZ raised dahlias so he considers importing not as important.
In the season of 1988/89 the Southland Trial Gardens were set up at Northope on a block of ground which was separated from the main gardens by a stand of trees. The first planting took place on November 7, with 84 plants and 45 cultivars. The winner that year of the Hokonui Award for exhibition was Brian Buckley with 'Tui Orange', the Takitimu Award was not awarded but there were 5 Awards of Merit. Two of these cultivars still appear on the show bench today, 'Maltby Fanfare' and 'Oreti Duke'.
In 2003 Walter and Kit Jack sold their farm at Northope and sold Belle Fleur Gardens to Paul Fieten who relocated the nursery to Lorneville on the outskirts of Invercargill. The Southland Dahlia Circle were fortunate to be allocated a block of ground on the new Lorneville property to continue the trial grounds.
Looking back they would do it all again, there were sleepless nights in the middle of winter wondering if the heating systems in the sheds were still operating and disappointment when storms went through the display beds in the middle of flowering. "But we always got there".
Reproduced from the NDSNZ Autumn Bulletin 2007
