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What are the mixed and future-oriented techniques of plants preservation ?

Plant preservation is an industry in constant evolution. Whether it is to create better products, to preserve other varieties of flowers, or to find more eco-friendly methods, each manufacturer creates new techniques. In this article, you will read more about the mixed and future techniques known to date, and what can change.

Mixed techniques of plant preservation

In the magazine, we previously explained—here, here, and there—that there were techniques allowing dehydration, rehydration, absorption, coloration, and sometimes all at the same time. Depending on the desired result and function of each plant, it is possible to use combinations of all these techniques. 

What is the mixed techniques used on orchids?

To give you an example, most orchids sold on secondflor.us are dehydrated with an alcohol-based solution and rehydrated with alcohol and glycerin. This is the classic flower preservation technique. However, Thai purple orchid is dehydrated with silica gel and then rehydrated only with glycerin. There is no alcohol involved in the process, in order to preserve its original color.

Why are preserved plants bleached?

When using the flower preservation technique, the dehydration phase by immersion will cause both dehydration and discoloration of the plant. Blanching a plant has an advantage: the desired color added during the preservation by immersion will be sublimated. Other techniques exist to bleach a plant, but they are prohibited in Europe. For example, the use of chlorine is too dangerous for your breath. As for bleach, it attacks the plant that will eventually crumble. As a worldwide company, we chose to apply this prohibition to you as well, because we care for your clients.

What preservation techniques can we use in the future?

The importance of R&D in the plant preservation industry

For each plant there is a specific formulation of temperatures, air, solution as well as specific preservation periods that respect the seasonality of each plant. These formulas are constantly evolving as new things are discovered. For instance, it has recently been discovered that increasing the acidity of the solution allows the plant to be greedier of substitute sap.

We also discovered new materials that will help us preserve plants that were not originally preserved. It is the Japanese who do the most research and development in the world to try to develop new varieties and succeed in preserving plants that until now had always failed.

Future-oriented techniques used to dye more flowers and plants

For example, some colors may not be rendered during the process. Depending on the starting color of the plant, there are pigments that do not adhere to the flower. This may be due to chlorophyll or pigments already in the plant. There are technologies coming up to solve this. For example, it is possible to let the plant dry in the sun to burn the chlorophyll and thus avoid a pigment conflict. But for the process to succeed, you need a certain amount of sunlight that is still difficult to predict in advance.

A CO₂-based flower preservation technique

The Dutch, for their part, are developing a CO₂-based flower preservation technique. It has the advantage of being the only technology that can be implemented in Europe, even if the necessary machine is currently very expensive. Alcohol-based preservation processes are banned due to very high safety constraints. The countries that practice it, such as Colombia or Kenya, fill huge containers of alcohol in which they dip flowers. If we were to do the same in Europe, safety standards would be far too stringent. This Dutch invention would drastically reduce the production time of a preserved flower compared to what is done today.

Between mixed techniques and future-oriented ones, the preserved plant industry is only at its beginnings. In any case, it promises good progress in the years to come. Find our preserved and dried flowers and plants on secondflor.us.