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Historically Bunting & Sons has been involved in horticulture and the origins are traced back to Isaac Bunting who first established the business as a nursery and seedsman. The business has passed from generation to
generation and has specialised in horticulture including: landscape gardening and the production of trees and shrubs, seeds, Japanese lilies, freesias, tulips, iris, tomatoes, mushrooms and biological
control of crop pests.
Two aspects of the historical horticultural production stand out for their innovation and forward thinking, particularly for their period.
The importation and cultivation of Japanese lilies in the late 19th Century was a great achievement in its day. Isaac Bunting (the younger) - married in 1880 and emigrated to Japan with his wife Annie and established his home
and business in Yokohama. In those days there was no air travel and a sea voyage of that distance was a long, expensive and sometimes dangerous undertaking. Isaac travelled to a distant country where there were virtually no other English people, and there he built a home, a
successful business and brought up a family. The bulbs he exported to the UK were rather exotic for their time and proved very popular and gave Bunting & Sons a unique product to grow and sell here in Colchester, which made the firm the leading supplier of lilies in the country
The second unique innovation is more recent. Following on from the move of the nursery from North Station Road to Great Horkesley in 1979, several innovative techniques were employed to increase production. Ben Bunting
switched horticultural production to mainly intensive tomato production in the 1980's and introduced fully computerised environmental control within the glasshouses; carbon dioxide enrichment of the atmosphere to improve plant growth; sodium lighting to extend the season; use of rockwool
as a substrate growing medium; thermal screens to save energy and bumble bees for pollination, all of which combined to increase good quality production. The result was very high quality crops and very tasty fruit which commanded higher prices.
Sadly, as the 1990's drew to a close, the production of year round high input crops heated by expensive fossil fuels had become unviable as well as uncompetitive against cheap foreign imports and without being able to find
any other crops to grow profitably, Bunting & Sons ceased glasshouse crop production at the end of 2000.
Alternative crops were subsequently trialled, but none were found to be economically viable. As an interim measure the firm undertook egg and pig product trials in multi span glasshouses. These trials have demonstrated that
barn type "free range" production is technically possible and by using lighting to create extended day length for year round continuity it is currently being pursued.
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