Wholesale Nursery Management

There are 8 lessons in this course:

1. Nursery Site Organisation: Buying an established nursery or establishing a new site, site planning, estimating space requirements.
2. Management: Government and commercial nurseries, partnerships, companies, sole proprietorships, developing a management structure, labour relations and seasonal staff, work programs and production timing.
3. Nutrition and Pest Management: Field crops, container plants, principles of fertiliser use and plant nutrition.
4. Growing Media: Soils and soil-free mixes, rockwool, sterilisation, techniques.
5. Irrigation: Methods and equipment, estimation of water requirements and use of liquid fertilisers through irrigation.
6. Modifying Plant Growth: Modification techniques, flower forcing and quality control.
7. Marketing Strategies: Exploiting existing markets, developing new markets, advertising, product presentation, pricing, plant recycling.
8. Selection of Nursery Crops: Developing a stock list, operational flow charts, market surveys.

Each lesson culminates in an assignment which is submitted to the school, marked by the school's tutors and returned to you with any relevant suggestions, comments, and if necessary, extra reading.

• Describe how site characteristics influence the establishment and management of wholesale nurseries.
• Explain management structures and work scheduling in wholesale nurseries.
• Describe the management of pests and diseases and plant nutrition in production nurseries.
• Explain the physical and chemical properties of growing media used in production nurseries.
• Describe the techniques and equipment used to irrigate plants in nurseries.
• Explain techniques used to modify and influence the growth of plants in production nurseries
• Describe strategies used by production nurseries to increase sales.
• Explain criteria for selecting plants and developing a nursery stock list.

• Investigate existing wholesale nursery operations.
• Conduct tests to determine chemical and physical characteristics of three different potting mixes.
• Design a classified advertisement, to promote a wholesale nursery, in a specified publication.
• Analyse the management structure of an existing production nursery.
• Evaluate the efficiency of propagating and potting up plants