Horticulturist

Horticulturists find work in two distinct areas: agriculture and landscape design. The training for both of these specialties is the same but the day-today activities are different. People with a Bachelor of Science degree in botany, biology, or agriculture may find employment as horticulturists after college. A strong training in the basic sciences, especially chemistry and biology, is necessary.

An agricultural horticulturist is responsible for investigating the best techniques for managing the aboveground aspects of agriculture. These include pruning, mulching, trellising, plant spacing, and pollination. His or her partners in this endeavor are the agronomist, who is concerned with fertilization, irrigation, and drainage, and the integrated pest manager who is concerned with plant pathogens and pests. Each must know the essentials of the others' fields and all must work together to produce profitable food and fiber crops.

The landscape horticulturist is concerned with all aspects of plant growth: aboveground aspects and fertilization, irrigation, and drainage. The landscape horticulturist must also have training in art and architecture. It is essential to know the requirements of decorative plants. Horticulturists work for commercial nurseries; schools or businesses with a "campus" or landscaped grounds; entertainment centers such as theme parks; and local, state, and federal governmental agencies (such as public works departments) for the creation of green spaces and color spots along highways, in city parks, or in residential areas.

see also Agriculture; Agronomist; Propagation

Dennis Carnes

Bibliography

Acquaah, George. Horticulture: Principles and Practice. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1997.

Garner, Jerry. Careers in Horticulture and Botany. New York: Barnes and Noble, 1999.

horticulture [Lat. hortus =garden], science and art of gardening and of cultivating fruits, vegetables, flowers, and ornamental plants. Horticulture generally refers to small-scale gardening, and agriculture to the growing of field crops, usually on a large scale, although the distinction is not always precise (for example, market gardening could be classed either way). A horticultural variety of a plant is one produced under cultivation, as distinguished from the botanical species or varieties, which occur in nature. Although many horticultural practices are very ancient (see botany ), comparatively recent knowledge of genetics, plant physiology, biochemistry, ecology, plant pathology, entomology, molecular biology, and soils, and the systematic application of such knowledge to practical use (e.g., in plant breeding ), has expanded horticulture into an extremely complex science. Agencies such as the various bureaus of the Dept. of Agriculture, the state experimental stations, and the many agricultural colleges; organizations such as the American Horticultural Society and the various state horticultural societies and local granges and garden clubs; and the commercial flower-growing and experimental nurseries (see nursery )—all engage in developing, analyzing, systematizing, and disseminating improved horticultural practices for the benefit of both amateur and professional gardeners. See also garden .

Bibliography: See E. P. Christopher, Introductory Horticulture (1958); J. B. Edmond et al., Fundamentals of Horticulture (3d ed. 1964); T. H. Everett, The New York Botanical Garden Illustrated Encyclopedia of Horticulture (10 vol., 1980–82).

Horticulture

Horticulture is the science and art of growing and caring for plants, especially flowers, fruits, and vegetables. Whereas agronomy (a branch of agriculture) refers to the growing of field crops, horticulture refers to small-scale gardening. The word horticulture comes from Latin and means "garden cultivation."

Within the field of horticulture, seed growers, plant growers, and nurseries are the major suppliers of plant products. Among the important specialists who work in the field of horticulture are plant physiologists, who work on the nutritional needs of plants, and plant entomologists, who work to protect plants from insect damage.

Horticulturists are often involved in the landscaping and maintenance of public gardens, parks, golf courses, and ball fields. For the amateur home gardener, the rewards

are both recreational and emotional. Gardening is one of the most popular pastimes for people—not only for those living in suburbs, but for city dwellers who plant window boxes, grow house plants, or develop a garden in an empty city lot.

Horticulturist

A horticulturist practices the scientific or practical aspects of horticulture— growing, producing, utilizing, and studying horticultural crop plants and plant products. Careers in horticulture range from the scientific to the applied.

Careers in horticulture can be found in government (both state and national) agricultural research agencies, public and private universities, small companies, and multinational corporations. Jobs may entail laboratory work, greenhouse crop production and/or management, and field production. Research may involve developing and testing new products or technologies to improve the quality, appearance, handling, storage, or research and development of new plants or plant-derived products. Additional fundamental research is done to gain understanding of plant function, physiology , biochemistry, and genetics at the organismal, cellular, enzymatic, or molecular levels.

Horticulturists interested in teaching find employment at the high school, community school, vocational school, community college, or university levels. Emerging careers in horticulture include the study of plant-people interactions (the effects plants have on people), and horticulture therapy—the use of horticulture and gardening as a means of rehabilitation for those with physical, mental, or emotional limitations or challenges.

The practical or applied horticulturist is trained to utilize or manage plants and to design and maintain landscapes appropriately. Field horticulturists may be involved in the production of fruits and nuts (pomology), grapes (viticulture), and flowers and greenhouse crops (floriculture). They may also handle the arrangement, display, and marketing of cut flowers and greenery (floristry). Other possible areas of responsibility include the production of ornamental plants, trees, and shrubs (nursery production); landscape design, installation, and management; public or private garden installation and care; the design, installation, and maintenance of plants in indoor environments (interior plantscaping); turfgrass production, installation, and upkeep; and the handling, storage, and shipping of horticulture crops or plant products. The practical field horticulturist handles plant nutrition by fertilization, water status by irrigation, and plant size and shape by pinching, pruning, training, and mowing. Plant growth, development, and flowering is managed by the use of regulating chemicals or environmental management (temperature and light intensity and duration). The horticulturist is often the person primarily responsible for pest (both insects and disease) control and prevention management. Ultimately, the horticulturist is responsible for producing plants or plant products of the highest quality, value, and appearance.

Exciting developments in horticulture include the exploration of new plants as landscape greenery or for their potential medicinal contents and the discovery of wild types of cultivated crop plants such as strawberry, onion, tomato, or apple, which may contain genes for disease resistance or improved nutritional quality. Crops are being bioengineered for improved pest resistance, thereby requiring less pesticide in production, and being modified for increased storage life. Molecular biology and genetic engineering may result in the development of entirely new crops and/or the production of plants containing phyto-pharmaceuticals—plant-produced chemicals for use as beneficial drugs. Molecular biology and biochemistry are shedding new light on how plants grow and function, which will lead to new developments in crop production systems and management.

The level of employment and responsibility of a horticulturist relates to one's amount of training, education, and experience. Horticultural training at the high school and vocational level typically involves work in plant management, production, and maintenance operations. At the college level, horticulturists receive fundamental education in plant science and biology as a foundation to understanding plant growth, development, and management. Typically, college curricula include strong training in science, including botany and plant anatomy/morphology, chemistry and biochemistry, genetics, physics, soil science, pest management, and plant physiology. Additionally, students receive training in the science and technology of horticulture, including greenhouse operations, nursery production, landscape design, landscape installation and management, fruit and vegetable production, and plant propagation. Students interested in pursuing scientific/technology development careers or those who wish to teach horticulture may continue college studies in a master's or Ph.D. program.

Beginning horticulturists are typically responsible for plant management operations. Increased education, training, and experience result in increased decision-making and responsibility for operations and crew management. Entry-level positions with no training or experience begin at minimum wage, but with higher levels of training, experience, and increased ownership of an operation, salaries exceeded $100,000 per year. In 1999, students with a college degree found employment in the range of $25,000 to $40,000 for entry-level management positions. Salaries increase with experience gained through internships, fellowships, special research projects, travel, and part-time employment.

Horticulture production, education, and science careers can be found throughout the world. In the United States, primary horticulture production occurs in California, Florida, Texas, Georgia, Michigan, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. However, landscape horticulture, retail garden center production, florist operations, public and private gardening, park landscape management, and landscaping design, installation, and maintenance operations flourish in all towns, cities, and metropolitan areas. International careers can be found through government and nongovernment agencies such as the Peace Corps, or with large multinational horticultural companies.

A commonality of horticulturists is, simply, that they enjoy working with plants. Horticulturists typically have a strong environmental ethic and enjoy contributing to beautifying and improving the environment and conserving natural resources.

see also Arborist; College Professor; Curator of a Botanical Garden; Curator of an Herbarium; Horticulture; Landscape Architect.

Curt R. Rom

Bibliography

Acquaah, George. Horticulture Principles and Practices. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1999.

Aggie Horticulture (Texas A&M University). [Online] Available at http://aggiehorticulture.tamu.edu/introhtml/internet.html.

American Society for Horticultural Science. [Online] Available at www.ashs.org.

Janick, Jules. Horticultural Science. New York: W. H. Freeman and Company, 1986.

Ohio State University Horticulture in Virtual Perspective. [Online] Available at http://www.hcs.ohio-state.edu/webgarden.html.

Virtual Garden. [Online] Available at http://www.vg.com/.

Horticulture

The word horticulture translates as "garden cultivation," or to cultivate garden plants. It was first used in publication in 1631 and was an entry in The New World of English Words in 1678. Today horticulture means the science, technology, art, business, and hobby of producing and managing fruits, vegetables, flowers and ornamental plants, landscapes, interior plantscapes, and grasses and turfgrasses. Although horticulture has been practiced for several millennia, it became a recognized academic and scientific discipline as it emerged from botany and medicinal botany in the late nineteenth century. Liberty Hyde Bailey, professor of horticulture at both Michigan State and Cornell Universities, is credited as the father of American horticulture, as he founded the first academic departments of horticulture.

Modern horticulture encompasses plant production (both commercial and gardening) and science, both practical and applied. Horticulture and the associated green industries are a rapidly developing professional field with increasing importance to society. The direct "farm-gate" value of horticultural crop production in the United States exceeds $40 billion; the overall value to the economy is much higher due to value added in preparation and preservation, or installation, and use and maintenance of horticultural plants and products.

Horticultural plants include fresh fruits and vegetables, herbaceous annual and perennial flowering plants, flowers produced as cut flowers for vase display, woody shrubs and trees, ornamental grasses, and turfgrasses used for landscapes and sports facilities. The crops encompass plants from tropical areas (fruits, vegetables, and tropical foliage plants) to those from the temperate zone. Horticulture crops are typically consumed or used as freshly harvested products and therefore are short-lived after harvest. Product quality, nutrition, flavor, and aesthetic appearance are important attributes of horticultural crops and are the goal of production and management. The production of horticultural plants is typified by intense management, high management cost, environmental control, significant technology use, and high risk. However, the plants, because of their high value as crops, result in very high economic returns. Horticultural crop plant production and maintenance requires extensive use of soil manipulation (including use of artificial or synthetic soil mixes), irrigation, fertilization, plant growth regulation, pruning/pinching/trimming, and environmental control. Plants can be grown in natural environments, such as orchards, vineyards, or groves for fruits, grapes, nuts, and citrus, or as row crops for vegetables. Plants can also be produced in very confined environments, such as in nurseries, greenhouses, growth rooms, or in pots. Horticultural plants exhibit wide variation and diversity in their cultivated varieties (cultivars) with differences in flower or fruit color and plant shape, form, size, color, or flavor and aroma adding to that diversity and to the plants' value.

Horticultural plants are very important to human health and well being and are critical to the environment of homes, communities, and the world. Horticulture food crops play an important role in human nutrition. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) recommends five to nine servings of fruits and vegetables be consumed daily to provide important nutrients and vitamins and to maintain overall good health. The use of landscape plants has been demonstrated to increase the property value of homes and improve communities and the attitudes of those owning or using the property. Use of plants in the landscape, development of public parks and greenbelts, and planting trees all help remediate pollution and contribute to production of oxygen in the air. Plants used indoors, whether flowers or house plants or interior plant scaping, improve the indoor environment by purifying air, removing some pollutants and dusts, and adding beauty, thereby improving the attitude and well being of those who occupy or use the inside areas.

A number of techniques are used in horticulture. New plant cultivars are developed through plant hybridization and genetic engineering. The number of plants is increased through plant propagation by seeds, cuttings, grafting, and plant tissue and cell culture. Plant growth can be controlled by pinching, pruning, bending, and training. Plant growth, flowering, and fruiting can also be controlled or modified by light and temperature variation. Further, growth and flowering can be altered by the use of growth-regulating chemicals and/or plant hormones. The rate of plant growth and quality of plant products are controlled by managing fertilizer and nutrient application through fertigation or hydroponic solution culture. Posthar-vest product longevity is controlled by manipulating plant or product hormone physiology or by controlling respiration by lowering temperature or modifying environmental gas content.

The scientific and technological disciplines of horticulture include plant genetics, plant breeding, genetic engineering and molecular biology, variety development, propagation and tissue culture, crop and environmental physiology, plant nutrition, hormone physiology and growth regulation, plant physical manipulation (pruning and training), and environmental control. The crop disciplines of horticulture include pomology (fruit and nut culture), viticulture (grape production), enology (wine production), oleri-culture (vegetable culture), floriculture (flower culture) and greenhouse management, ornamental horticulture and nursery production, arboriculture (tree maintenance), landscape horticulture, interior plant scaping, turf management, and postharvest physiology, preservation, and storage.

see also Agriculture, Modern; Botanical Gardens and Arboreta; Horticulturist; Hydroponics; Ornamental Plants; Propagation.

Curt R. Rom

Bibliography

Acquaah, George. Horticulture Principles and Practices. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1999.

American Society for Horticultural Science. [Online] Available at http:ashs.org.

Janick, Jules. Horticultural Science. New York: W. H. Freeman and Company, 1986.

Harlan, Jack R. The Living Fields: Our Agricultural Heritage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.

Lohr, Virginia I., and Diane Relf. "An Overview of the Current State of Human Issues in Horticulture in the United States." HortTechnology 10 (2000): 27-33.

hor·ti·cul·ture / ˈhôrtiˌkəlchər/ • n. the art or practice of garden cultivation and management. DERIVATIVES: hor·ti·cul·tur·al / ˌhôrtiˈkəlchərəl/ adj. hor·ti·cul·tur·al·ist / ˌhôrtiˈˌkəlchərəlist/ n. hor·ti·cul·tur·ist / ˌhôrtəˈˌkəlchərist/ n.

horticulture Growing of vegetables, fruits, seeds, herbs, shrubs, and flowers on a commercial scale. Techniques employed include propagation by leaf, stem, and root cuttings, and by stem and bud grafting. Fruit trees, shrubs, and vines are usually propagated by grafting the fruiting stock on to a hardier rootstock. seed is a major horticultural crop. Close scientific control of pollination is essential for producing crops of specific quality.

horticulture, horticultural societies Horticulture is the system of production that depends on the cultivation of plants. Horticultural societies are those in which this system predominates.

horticulture XVII. f. L. hortus garden.

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