Get to know Chris Wichman

Katie McDaniel: How did you get started in horticulture?

Chris Wichman: I got started in horticulture a little different than a lot of folks in the industry. I was not raised on a farm. I was a straight up city kid. I didn’t know the difference between a lot of plants growing up, and that all changed when I turned 19. I got my first job working in production agriculture, field crops, trees, vines, tomatoes, all sorts of stuff. We grow a lot here in central California. I spent most of my adult life working in that setting.

My wife and I have a pretty in-depth garden at home. We’ve always said how cool it would be to own or run a nursery. Well, lo and behold, one of our favorite nurseries here in town put out a job posting for an assistant production manager. I worked my way up, and now I’m the production manager.

KM: What do you do as production manager?

CW: From a high level, my role is to support my crews and make sure they grow good plants that we can sell. We start that with the staging of our crop cycles, and then we arrange all the plants that are incoming and that we’re growing through our own propagation. I help direct the team that plants them out. I manage the plant health team that keeps our plants flourishing throughout the season, and then I’m also supporting my growers that take care of them and ultimately are harvesting them for the sales.

So that sounds pretty simple, right? But I think everybody that works in the nursery can attest that it’s not that simple. Every one of those steps has action items that are happening on a day-to-day basis. The planting and the harvesting are happening simultaneously. To be productive in my role, I’ve got to help make sure that it’s a well-oiled train.

I really enjoy developing systems. Through systems you can manage situations and allows for flow to happen. When you have flow, uncertainty and stress are removed, and it helps increase employee satisfaction and job productivity.

KM: You’re speaking at Cultivate'26 about why California’s plastic recycling law matters to growers everywhere. Can you tell us what’s been going on in California?

CW: A couple of years ago, California passed Senate Bill 54, the Plastic Pollution Prevention and Packaging Producer Responsibility Act. It sets up an EPR, which is the Extended Producer Responsibility, and it’s putting the onus on the producer of the single-use plastic.

KM: Why should a grower in another state care about this California law?

CW: EPRs are popping up all over the nation. They’re widespread across legislations. I think seven states now have EPRs that they have proposed, and every year there’s going to be more that are coming on board. So it’s just a matter of time before plastic recycling acts are widespread.

KM: What are some practical solutions for nursery containers?

CW: The first thing we think of is the ability to recycle it, so that it can go back into the flow of plastic creation. But this is a difficult process as folks will learn in our session. Hopefully we don’t put them in landfills. Then there’s also sterilization and reusing. Ultimately, what I think these laws are wanting to achieve is to move away from plastics as the number one use of nursery containers and other plastics involved, and they want biodegradable solutions.

KM: What are your thoughts on sustainability in horticulture?

CW: It’s necessary. It’s the way of the future. We can’t continue to fill up landfills and just move to another pile. There has to be ways that we can use less and still be as prosperous as we are now.

For more: belmontnursery.com