How nurseries in Northern Germany automate to save labor

Labor Efficiency Automation and Production: LEAP Nursery Crops Toward Sustainability organized an automation trip to visit 12 nurseries in Hamburg and Oldenburg, Germany, with 18 US stakeholders from seven states, 11 nurseries and three automation manufacturing companies. The region was once part of the Netherlands and growers share a similar dedication to efficiency. As a result, many common production tasks are highly automated. By working through the Southern Region International Plant Producers Society (IPPS-SR), LEAP teamed up with Fokko zur Mühlen, past president (2023), and Louise Heissel, IPPS-SR exchange student (2023), both from IPPS Europe, to help identify and organize automated nursery tours.

We brought innovators and early adopters of nursery automation as well as those who design, fabricate and sell it to observe entire automated nursery systems for potting, transport, spacing, pruning, harvesting, labeling, loading and shipping. Europe has been experiencing an extended labor shortage similar to growers in the U.S., while also utilizing foreign workers to accomplish tasks. The goal was to provide an observable experience for these select U.S. stakeholders and “seed” their automation adoption decisions as well as those of nearby growers observing them back in the U.S. over the next five years.

Nurseries in northern Germany tend to create indoor working environments for employees. Therefore plants are retrieved from the field using forks attached to tractors and brought inside for pruning, nutrient or rice hull topdressing, potting up in some cases, then returned to new or original spacing. This process repurposes the buffering tables associated with potting machines to “unspace” retrieved plants, convey them through automation again, then rebuffer spacing before returning. Employees touch fewer plants, remain dry and close to restrooms or breakrooms to save time and labor. View this and other automation on nurseryleap.com.

Core to much of German nurseries’ automation adoption is standardization, which may be most visible in their use of Danish trolleys, known collectively as Container Centralen or CC carts. CC carts are ubiquitous — they are used by most nurseries in Germany and across Europe. A tag on the rack is changed each year to show the nursery paid their yearly subscription in exchange for their use and free repairs of up to 2% of shelves. Repairs beyond 2% are 7 Euros per shelf. The CC rack company has a monopoly and causes growers to be 100% dependent on them, but there is the counterweight advantage of uniformity; they fit every transporter and collapse easily for return. Growers can plan for 44 CCs to fit on every semi, and they know exactly how many plants of a given size fit on the shelves at a given spacing. Before CC racks, it took one day to unload a truck. Now it takes 20 minutes.

At Baumschule Spitzmann, we saw the TTA (Tuinbouw Technisch Atelier) Flex Sorter, which is much like a super-sized transplanter for bedding plants, yet used for seedling transplants of forest tree woody crops. It has multiple grabbers that pluck germinated tree seedlings from their individual cells and transplant them into larger containers. A few weeks after trays are seeded, the Flex Sorter can distinguish ungerminated cells that contain only substrate, grade remaining seedling quality and both pluck the substrate from empty cells and consolidate full trays by grade. All progress is tracked on a monitor, and newly packed “100% germinated trays” go back to the field to finish growth before transplanting later. The Flex Sorter is available as rent-to-own in the German market. Baumschule Spitzmann owner Florian Zorn explained it costs him the equivalent of two employees per month to rent it but does the work of four people.

Nurseries of all sizes use fertilizer applicators. Some nurseries used these to top dress during the production cycle, while others used applicators at planting. At Renke zur Mühlen, Fokko zur Mühlen used a 3D printed fertilizer applicator costing approximately $4,000 Euros. His nursery was able to increase the number of plants fertilized per hour from 2,000 manually to 7,200 with the applicator.

The widespread adoption of automation in Germany is creating careers at the intersection of technology and agricultural production. Often we saw that a single worker supervised the automation, provided quality control, made small corrections, addressed maintenance issues and completed light work the equipment missed.

At Baumschule Spitzmann, a worker shared that, compared to their previous employment, they are now responsible for more engaging work, including training other workers on machine use, as well as maintaining its operation. The worker found new solutions that the Flex Sorter was not designed to complete. During the fall, the Flex Sorter picks them from trays so workers can place seedlings in boxes for cold storage. Workers then pick seedlings from the cooler for shipping orders, which allows them to stagger shipping throughout the winter.

Since the LEAP project’s inception, we’ve heard multiple testimonials from growers about finding secondary uses for automation that both improved the return on investment and shortened the payback period. Simply having the automation has allowed them to imagine new possibilities, accept more contracts or complete work more efficiently.

Anthony LeBude is Associate Professor, Nursery Crop Research and Extension, NC State University. Amy Fulcher is Professor for Sustainable Ornamental Plant Production and Landscape Management, University of Tennessee.

Labor, Efficiency, Automation, and Production: LEAP Nursery Crops Toward Sustainability is supported by the Specialty Crops Research Initiative Coordinated Agriculture Project award no. 2024-51181-43291 & Planning Grant 2020-51181-32137 from the United States Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture.