YOUR INDUSTRY
GETTING IT RIGHT WITH GREENS Words by Helena O’Neill
Dale and Hannah Jordan bought Saddleview Greens nine years ago and now grow hydroponic lettuce, spinach and kale for the local market
The move to horticulture nearly a decade ago has given an Otago couple new opportunities and challenges. Dale and Hannah Jordan bought Saddleview Greens nine years ago, growing hydroponic lettuce, spinach and kale for the local market. “This place popped up … we hummed and hawed for about a year and decided to jump in. We’re a lot better off now, being able to tend to the kids as we work from home,” Dale says. The couple had never before worked in horticulture or hydroponics, so it was a big move to take over the operation at Wingatui, near Dunedin. “I knew nothing about hydroponics at all, let alone lettuce, when we bought the place. It’s been a big learning curve.” In peak season the Jordans grow green frilly, red frilly, red oak, cos and butterhead lettuces. In the cooler months, the business grows green frilly, cos and red oak lettuces, with the latter mostly used for the mixed salad bags. “The cos can be quite popular, although we can’t grow it very big this time of year. The beauty of hydroponic lettuces is that they’re very clean. You can use every leaf off the lettuce, and I think people like that, especially this time of year.”
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They also grow one variety each of spinach and kale all year round. Spinach and kale have grown in popularity over the years, with orders between five to 10 crates a week when they first took over the business, rocketing to between 20 and 30 crates a day. “It [spinach] grows really, really fast in the summer. With the speed of growth being so fast it doesn’t have a long shelf-life.” The business supplies MG Marketing and restaurants through Dunedin-based Kaan’s Catering Supplies, along with their local supermarket Mosgiel New World. One of the major challenges facing the business this year has been the low sunshine hours. “It’s really hard to get it right.” “We did throw a lot of lettuce out last year. We’re going to be a bit more organised next year because we have a bit more authority on how our seedlings get planted by Zealandia in Christchurch. We know what the delivery date is going to be now, so we can be better organised about what’s coming.” “I've been of the opinion that it's much better to have too much than not enough, and if I end up throwing things out then that’s just part and parcel of how it works.
