Epcot Is Coming Up Flowers

If you thought Disney was just about Mickey Mouse, fun-loving attractions and crowds, think again. I've recently returned from the 8th Annual Epcot International Flower & Garden Festival down in Orlando, Florida. For seven weeks from late April through early June, much of Epcot is transformed into a world-class horticulture arena.

My association with Goldsmith Seeds brought me to the festival. Goldsmith representatives spoke four times each weekend on Color Therapy and Gardening Made Simple. In fact, my columns in the following two weeks will reflect those talks.

It's also a fact that many of the flowering bedding plants displayed at all the Disney parks are dominated by flower varieties bred by Goldsmith Seeds. This includes flowering display beds at not only Disneyland in Anaheim, but also the Magic Kingdom in Florida and MGM/Disney Studios in Florida.

Of course, nobody displays flowers better than Disney either. At Epcot, Goldsmith varieties were planted in huge display beds throughout Future World and the World Showcase. There were huge free-standing topiaries containing Goldsmith's Freestyle ivy geraniums, topiary butterflies of Firefly miniature impatiens and winding beds of Accent impatiens and Sparkler cleome in the beautiful Canadian pavilion. Interestingly the Canadian exhibit is dominated by a 4-story mountain on which Goldsmith's Ramblin' trailing petunias flowed.

By the way, you'll win Mickey ears if you can tell me what Epcot stands for. Give up? The answer: Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow.

Epcot's Flower & Garden Festival featured Tips from the Pros, of which myself and other Goldsmith representatives were a part of. But it was also much more. More than 100 topiaries of Disney characters were spread throughout the park. Sculptures and garden art graced walkways, artists specializing in garden themes were on hand and there was a bug adventure garden for kids during which butterflies and ladybugs were released twice daily. Disney horticulturists spoke, and special guided behind-the-scenes tours of Disney's horticulture facilities were also available for a fee.

Hands-on activities included irrigating rice paddies in Asia, grinding cassava into flour in Africa and wiggling through a worm tunnel in the good ol' USA pavilion within the World Showcase.

And in keeping with the Flower Power theme, Disney scheduled musical groups from the 1960s and 70s to entertain. The weekend I was there, one of my all-time favorites -- Peter Noone of Herman's Hermits -- performed. There's nothing quite like enjoying flowers to the tune of & "Mrs. Brown You've Got a Lovely Daughter."

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