SKAGIT VALLEY, Wash. — While prairie farmers still plan what to seed in their fields, tulip farmers in this area of Washington are facing some of their busiest weeks of the year.
Thousands of tourists daily trek from Seattle, Vancouver and places in between to undertake the annual “tulip tour” through this scenic valley.
Between daffodil and iris seasons the multi-colored tulips bloom: fields are divided into strips of vibrant yellows, reds, pinks, white, and any other color that can be concocted by plant breeders.
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Recognizing the need to attract customers, and perhaps because it would be difficult to keep these horticulturists and photographers away, the valley’s farmers have helped encourage the tourism.
It’s a booming business: roadside stands on or near the farms advertise bouquets or bulbs, crafts, and food for sale. Local towns have developed restaurants, lodges and tourist shops. They target seniors on bus tours, cyclists, families in vehicles, and students on school tours who descend upon this area. Colorful postcards and slick color brochures help promote the farms.
Tourism can be tied to farming but there also comes the potentially negative side.
Farmers must patiently accept that every road nearby will be tied up with tourist traffic stretching anywhere from a quarter to a half mile or more. While signs plead for people to stay on the roadways and out of the fields, there continues to be people “tiptoeing through the tulips,” or children racing through the flowers to be captured on video.
With few shoulders on the roads, parking is limited; extra staff are needed full time to direct traffic into parking lots.
Occasionally tourists will also get in the way of the people who are working in the fields, and it is hard to watch that no tourist steals flowers.
It may be easier — and quieter — to grow wheat.
