Flowers more than just beautiful

Ramsay Muir, pictured in his wildflower garden in late-December, surrounded by Queen Anne’s Lace and Pink Celene.

Te Puke orchardists Ramsay and Lorraine Muir have more than kiwifruit on their minds at harvest time.

The couple, who have 27 canopy hectares of mostly Hayward fruit on No 4 Rd, are as passionate about wildflowers as they are about kiwifruit and use this time of year to plan for what they hope will be a multi-hued display of colour around their home and orchard come spring.

“There’s no guarantees with wildflowers and sometimes you need to plant them multiple times before they strike; but when they do, the result is stunning,” says Ramsay.

A third-generation Muir from one of Te Puke’s longest established families, Ramsay has grown wildflowers for nearly three decades. While he began as a hobbyist, growing them in a garden bed near the house, Ramsay’s success motivated him to continue planting smaller plots around his section. Not stopping there, he continued sowing seed on driveways leading into his orchard and in small gully areas where kiwifruit can’t grow.

Helps pollination

Although initially planted for their beauty, the Muirs found the flowers also helped in the pollination of their kiwifruit. Unlike typical kiwifruit orchardists, who remove nearby flowers during pollination time, the Muirs choose to leave their wildflowers in place.

“Bees need nectar for energy and wildflowers are full of it,” says Ramsay. “We see the bees staying in our orchard where the food is before going on to pollinate the kiwifruit. No one else has wildflower beds in their orchard but it obviously does no harm. In fact, our best production often comes from parts of the orchard where the wildflowers are.”

He sources his seed from Wildflower World, spending hours thumbing through catalogues and planning out his spring and summer displays. The mix Ramsay most often sows is Highfield Meadow but he has also used Country Road, Summer Dazzler and Pollinator Mix, which helps to attract bees.

After preparing the soil, using a combination of hand-tilling and machinery, he’ll sow his wildflower beds from late July. The earliest flower varieties will pop up in August.

Continual wonderment

“We’ll see Toad Flax first then Purple Tansy, Gypsophilia then Poppies which are hard to beat when they’re out on mass,” says Ramsay. “They pop up in three stages and as they emerge it’s a source of continual wonderment.

“I love them and all the planting and weeding keeps me fit. Plus I believe it’s a good thing to be sympathetic to the environment and what its needs are. Wildflowers are a plentiful food source for bees and bumblebees, in particular. Our orchard is a constant hum at pollination time with them and I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

The Muirs encourage other people to plant wildflowers and share concerns raised by the New Zealand Bumblebee Conservation Trust about the threat to horticulture posed by a decline in bumblebee populations.

The trust was created last year to educate New Zealanders about the immediate action required to protect bumblebees for the continued production of food crops, now and in the future. Its goal is to ensure New Zealand is continually plentiful in bumblebees and other pollinator insects.

Bumblebee food

Co-founder Geoff Brunsden applauds the efforts of the Muirs for helping to make a difference. “Wildflowers are a wonderful food source for bumblebees which are one of the best pollinators on the planet. They are 50 times more effective at pollinating than honeybees, and many Kiwis don’t realise how crucial they are to our food crops.

“Extinction would see a dramatic decline in the whole food production industry, and loss of variety of crops. Food prices would increase and the country would be more reliant on imports, which in turn would increase food costs. We need more people like the Muirs to play their part.”

Trust co-founder Helen Johnson says New Zealand is experiencing a declining number of bumblebees due to a ‘perfect storm’ of factors, including reduced greenscape, disease, increasing use of toxic pesticide spray, loss of food resources, genetic modification of seeds and flowers and pests.

“What we’re doing at the NZBCT is encouraging people to look at bumblebees and pollinators in a new light and understand the significant contribution they make to the horticultural industry.”


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