Twixwood is in business, working, going full bore, shipping, and expressing optimism about the year. We are at full strength with all the workers we can find room for and we are just about right on our production schedule. The production schedule is the result of three days of studying spread sheets looking at sales history, ascertaining trends, and then making wild guesses about the future. We keep in mind, every day, Yogi Berra’s famous dictum: “It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future.” And then we go ahead and do it anyhow.
Here is the production cycle: Pachysandra can be cut and stuck in July and August, Vinca minor is done over a longer period at a different time of the year (this is a big trade secret to everyone except friends and International Plant Propagators Society members because it took me nearly a lifetime to figure out how to do it right), Ivy can be done any day of the year. Grasses and Carexes are done in the winter when they are dormant, although some are made during a very short window of opportunity. Perennials are propagated early when they just come up. It goes on. The potting up of perennial liners into pots can be done, here again, any day of the year except they do not grow until the dormancy period of some five to six weeks has happened and after that some heat has been applied. We are potting perennials every week from February up until October.
But, do not let me burden you with our personal problems, we want to sell you all some plants. We have an opportunity in the next very few days to over-produce two rare grasses—Sporobolus h. ‘Tara’ and Bouteloua g. ‘Blonde Ambition’ PP#22,948. Our high priced computer person/sales organizer person here at the nursery is paid to make the right predictions and thus he is leery of over-production. I, on the other hand, am afraid of missing a sale. 
Besides, I do not get in trouble for making incorrect predictions and, given the frailties of memory at this stage in my life, never remember when I ever made a mistake. Therefore, if you will want any of these two grass liners in quantity, call immediately and state about what you think you will want and I will then get to make more than we had planned and be overly happy to do so.
A word about this ‘Blonde Ambition’; it is a near-ideal plant as it looks strikingly and has winter hardiness issues, if one considers dying dead in the winter to be an ‘issue’. We cannot say anything about hardiness as we; here on the Sunset Coast of Lake Michigan, are a zone and a half warmer than Chicago. Over here it dies in heavy wet soil in the winter but not in sandy well-drained soil so we have no idea if it is a soil issue or a hardiness issue. Anyhow it is about time that we make a little money, it has been a long hard life.
Things, as mentioned, are looking good, no one has died from virus issues. And while we attempt to not mention politics while we are trying to sell plants, the governor over here in Michigan has shut down all garden centers, lawn mower repair shops, landscapers, and lawn mowing people. The Michigan Landscape and Nursery Association has convinced the governor that all nurseries are essential businesses, so we are legal, not that anyone here at the nursery worries that much about it as only the owner can go to jail. If you start getting really long blogs every couple of days, you may be able to figure out why I suddenly have so much time on my hands.
