Nir Nursery is a breeding and propagating company of Wax flowers and other Australian native plants for the cut flower and pot plant industry. The family agriculture farm was started in 1932 by Yochevet and Haim Nir, Nitzan Nir's grandparents. In 1965 his parents Gideon and Roni Nir, started managing the farm and began a flower farm with Carnations, gypsophila, and later wax flowers. Nitzan and his wife Tali joined the business in 1983 and established a propagation nursery for wax flower and pot plants. This is explained by Nitzan Nir, owner of this company that is celebrating its 40th anniversary next year.
With the establishment of the nursery, Nir Nursery found new seedlings of wax variants. The company started selecting the best ones, and from that to "real breeding," the distance was short. In the beginning, they had just 3 wax varieties, supplying only three winter months to Europe alone. The team and Nitzan developed systematic techniques - "market-orientated breeding," based on collected data from final customers and growers to understand the market demands and possible future developments they could implement.
"The market required high volumes of consistent product year-round, so we focused our breeding and development on those goals," said Nitzan. These days, Nir Nursery supplies varieties that flower from early autumn through winter until early summer. We have developed farming partnerships with growers in southern and northern hemisphere countries, making it possible to supply the growing demand of the global markets year-round," Nitzan explains.
"When the 4th generation, my son Asaf, joined the team in 2000, we started thinking about how to keep our products relevant for the markets in the future," Nitzan informed. "Checking the development and marketing history of similar crops, we decided that we needed to keep evolving the product. Following this decision, we adjusted our breeding program to match this goal."
Wax flower new products
Nitzan gives some examples of their new wax flower products. "Color Wax," for example. The line is unique for their stem color (red, orange, and bright green), with a long harvesting period, it can be used as a foliage filler, or the grower can sell it after it flowers.
"Jupiter Wax Line™" is a line of flowers with terminal inflorescences, which means that the flowers are all concentrated on the top of the stem giving it a volume on the top, unlike other varieties in which the flowers are on the side of the stem.
Intergeneric cross:
Rey is a new product, an inter-generic cross. The flowers bloom from mid-winter to mid-summer.
Other new products:
Chris-Tal is a new adenanthos selection, ideal for a Christmas tree potted plant.
Curly is Isopogon for the foliage market.
Red lead, Amazon, and Aurora are three Anigozanthos varieties that are good for both cut flowers and winter flowering pot plants.
Looking to the future
Nir Nursery focuses on breeding for vase life, flower variation, and high quality. They have many pot and garden plant varieties in the pipeline, many more in the testing phase, and some already entering the marketing side.
"Marketing new alternative-looking flowers and varieties can be challenging for a small family business, especially in conservative markets with strong traditional styles that are not always open to change. Despite that, based on our product's market and business results, we see a very bright future for our breeding lines," says Nitzan. Click here to see a video presentation.
For more information: 
Nir Nursery
Nitzan Nir
Email: [email protected]
www.nir.co.il