Image Credit: Adam Donnelly / CFJC Today
FLOWER POWER

Spring planting begins throughout City of Kamloops

May 21, 2021 | 4:15 PM

KAMLOOPS —It’s going to feel like summer this coming weekend, and it’s going to look like it as well. City crews have begun planting flowers and greenery to give Kamloops some colour.

Parks and Civic Facilities Manager Jeff Putnam says the City’s greenhouse is filled with roughly 50,000 plants for distribution, and it will take City staff two to three weeks to get all the flowers and bedding plants in place.

Bringing in the majority of plants from elsewhere has become less expensive than growing all of them within the City’s greenhouse facility, and Putnam says this year’s order is about $55,000 worth.

“The grower that we source them from is called Meadowlands in the Fraser Valley and they just do a beautiful job,” he explains. “These are really healthy plants and they actually do not use pesticides which is great. And about 80 per cent of the species and varieties that we ordered are pollinator-friendly as well.”

According to Putnam, Riverside Park, Sandman Centre and City Hall areas will be planted this week, with the North Shore and Columbia Street corridor to follow after that.

“We’ve got one really special surprise that no one is going to be expecting that’ll be put in place about ten days from now,” adds Putnam, “and all I’m going to say as a hint is just to keep your eye on the McGill Road and Bunker Road area.”