Our crown flower trees are now bare with hardly much leaves left.  Leaves (are) were munched by butterfly caterpillars for the last month and a half. It is a devastated sight from a crown flower farmer or a home owner perspective. But to caterpillars, fatten by every inch of leaves is a must, in order to get ready for coconing, then becoming butterflies.  We put our blinders on and let the caterpillars munch on. We welcome the devastation, knowing that there will be more butterflies for the world.  The tree will be refilled with leaves again. It will be soon be spring, summer, fall, then again butterflis return and lay their eggs.

Storm Iselle’s damage to Big Island farm crops is estimated at $53M. Please volunteer or make your donation.

See link below on how you can help.

 http://khon2.com/2014/08/12/donation-options-to-aid-big-island-residents-devastated-by-iselle/

Did you know we use Hawaii grown lilies, snapdragons, and hydrangeas every chance we can. We found that the quality of the flowers will be nicer since they are in transport for a few hours rather than a couple of days. Besides, it is better for the environment.  We love our flower grower at the Big Island. Enjoy your Friday. 

Hope you have enjoyed your Valentine arrangement.  Remember, the arrangement can be placed in the green bin for green waste collection.  The glass container can be reused a few more times before placing into the blue bin for glass container collection.

Here is progress of our flower shop backyard.  It is a little weedy after the rainy winter season. We have a baby pineapple coming up.  So cute. Yeah. Our cactus shot up about 6 feet before flowering. We still have the basil and the rosemary plants, fighting their turfs with the weeds.  Remember, the water we changed out goes here, to grow plants in the back yard.  Less water needed from the Board of Water Supply and less water goes to the water treatment plant.  Summer is here!  Conserve water when we can.

Unwrap your bouquet of ribbon, plastic sleeve, and wet paper towel; put it in a vase with some water; you could enjoy your bouquet for another few days.  Better yet, order your bouquet with open stems and no unwraping is required. After the prom, simply place your bouquet in a mid-size vase with some water. Enjoy your prom.  Enjoy your bouquet.

unwraping is easy.

After the bouquet flowers wilted, untie the bouquet, check to see if the flowers are wired (orchids, plumeria, hypericums are usually wired).  Flowers with wire removed can be tossed into your green recycle bin (yard waste bin) for greencycling. Wire can be tossed into your regular waste.  H-power will pick out the metal wire before it goes into the burner.

Our hanging basket flowers are wilted and somehow its offspring made it in the crack of the asphalt pavement in our parking lot. That proved to me that good thing doesn’t always end up where you planned but it is still end up being a good thing.

It’s time to dispose your Christmas tree and wreaths and it’s tempting to just throw them all in the trash. But it is worth while to separate them out for reuse and recycle first. In Kapahulu area, our next green waste (green bin) pick up is on January 8, Thursday.

Tabletop Christmas tree (topiary) – Pull off all ornaments, save them for next year to be reused. Pull all the greens and dispose them in the (green waste) green bin. Dispose the oasis in the (refuse) gray bin. The vase can be reuse or donate to Goodwill.

Wreath with metal base. – Pull off all ornaments, save them for next year to be reused. The remaining metal base and green is best just thrown in the gray bin. H-power will pick out the metal before burning the rest.

Wreath with natural twig basePull off all ornaments, save them for next year to be reused. Or call your local florist to see if they would take back the wreath. Some would certainly take the time to unwire the greens and save the twig base for future use.

Norfolk Christmas tree is rather easy to set up for treecycle.
1. Take off all the hung ornaments first and store them for future use.
2. Snap off the branches as you untangle the lights, wrapping the lights into a ball and store for next year use.
3. Snap off the remaining branches and bunch them in a pile.
4. Saw the main trunk in two or three pieces.
5. bundle everything and place them in the green bin.

We will not be carrying greens of the myrtle family such as eucalyptus and myrtle imported from the mainland until further notice. Last year’s emergency ruling of banning the import of Myrtaceae plants and plant parts from California and Florida, and from Central and South America expired this August. In the mean time, the Plant Pest Quarantine branch of the State Department of Agriculture has already set up a quarantine procedure on how to handle the Myrtaceae coming into Hawaii.  Until a permanent ruling is set, we will not be ordering the myrtle, since there is no guarantee that our supplier is getting our myrtle outside of the infected area.

The plant disease ohia rust (puccinia psidii) is infecting our island trees especially the ohia. For your next flower arrangement and wedding order, please ask your local florist to substitute the myrtle with other greens.

College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources, University of Hawaii
Hawaiian Ecosystems at Risk project (hear.org)
Pacific Island Network
hawaii.gov-Department of Argriculture
honolulu weekly 

Free Delivery to Kaimuki area on June 28 & 29. No special occasion. Just thought your family and friends from the Kaimuki area could use some flowers. It’s going to be hot this summer and flowers from their yards may not be looking exactly the best. We offered free delivery to Waikiki hotels a few months back and it was such a hit that we want to offer this free delivery to our nearby neighborhood as well. Watch for our free delivery special for the Manoa, Kahala and Moiilili area soon. Don’t worry about the gas price rising in Hawaii. We delivered your flowers in a Toyota hybrid.