Stymied by COVID-19 pandemic tourism shutdown, couple opens backyard core in Tamuning

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Carly Champaco-Munoz, Pacific daily information

The pandemic's impact on tourism, and the recent legalization of leisure cannabis on island, introduced a chance for a Guam couple to show their home gardening hobby into a brand new company — selling gardening elements and machine commonly tough to locate on island or hasn't been bought here.

India Sekiguchi, and her husband, Ken, final November began returned to Nature — Gardening & Hydroponics after their tourism-linked wholesale company, which has been working because 2007, became hit by using the pandemic shutdown. Their wholesale business sells snack food, wine and beer, she stated.

"My husband's at all times adored gardening. I truly went to an agricultural high school, in Australia," said India Sekiguchi, who grew up in Yigo and returned to island more than a decade ago. "We each love vegetation and animals, and we idea now will be the perfect time to encompass ourselves with flowers and animals."

They turned their wholesale warehouse, on choose-A-Nail street, in Tamuning, into a retail gardening shop, dealing at once with purchasers for the primary time.

"Our convention room became our little boutique store for prime-conclusion vitamins and minerals, fertilizers, succulent planters," she observed.

committed to gardening

"We're the first committed gardening core," she noted. "There's no distraction here. There's no development fabric. we're pure, 100% backyard-concentrated."

The save has a huge inventory of superb potting soil in stock, in addition to further fertilizers and inert material to create custom soil mixes. The soil is brought in by container-load, she mentioned, which permits it to be sold at a lower cost.

The save sells hydroponic growing to be methods, hard-to-find seeds for Asian vegetables and potted flowers, together with strawberry plant life. The strawberry flowers grow outside and produce fruit devoid of death, India Sekiguchi said, however she recommends keeping them in pots as a substitute of planting them within the floor.

The range of accessible items within the store continues to develop, based on customer input. India Sekiguchi stated if a customer asks her about whatever thing as soon as, she notes it. If one other client asks in regards to the same component, she orders it.

"We in fact think that we've struck a chord with lots of people on Guam. Their reactions inform everything after they stroll into the shop. a lot of people are asserting it's like a non secular experience for them," she stated.

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hashish consumers

elements for several types of gardeners are grouped in separate areas of the store. gadget favorite through shoppers who grow cannabis — grow tents, LED grow lights and air flow systems — is displayed on the 2d ground, which is accessed by way of mountain climbing a steel ladder.

Guam in April 2019 legalized leisure cannabis on island, allowing residents 21 and older to develop and devour cannabis at home. It ought to be grown indoors, besides the fact that children.

"With the (hashish) legislation coming concerning the identical time as the pandemic, and the entire phenomenon of pandemic gardening, ... we've simply been hit up by each person who loves to develop," India Sekiguchi pointed out. "And we welcome americans, no depend what they're growing to be — no matter if it's hashish, orchids, succulents, vegetable patches."

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Restoring habitat

Sekiguchi spoke of again to Nature is about to delivery a partnership with the Guam department of Agriculture, as a part of a challenge to support residents restore habitat for native fowl species. The save will aid develop native plant species and distribute them at workshops, where counsel may be offered about plant life and birds.

"If Guam wants to emulate Saipan, Rota, these other islands that have had a success fowl reintroduction courses, we should bring lower back the vegetation that the birds consume," she observed. "we are able to't simply deliver returned the birds and expect them to eat these added flowers. They are looking to eat the native species."