Decembek 31. 1003. 



The Weekly Florists^ Review. 



263 



A RETROSPECT 



AND THE PROSPECT 



A Retrospect. 



Standing with tlie Old Year full of 

 days behind ns and at the threshold of 

 the New Year, it is fitting that a sum- 

 ming up shall be made of the year that 

 is gone, a trial-balanee drawn from 

 which we may see the net results of 

 what has been accomplished and may 

 gain some r.otion of whjre our course 

 should lie in the season for which prep- 

 aration must soon be under way, for in 

 this day and generation the successful 

 one is he who can see farthest into the 

 future. 



The Flood Tide. 



A year ago our trade stood at the flood 

 tide of its prosperity. Indeed, so stood 

 all the legitimate producing industries 

 of the entire country, and there were 

 but summer-day clouds in the business 

 sky. The cut flower growers, and their 

 department had developed to be un- 

 doubtedly the most extensive branch of 

 our business, were cutting splendid crops 

 in the first quarter of 1903. Not only 

 was production large in quantity but 

 quality was excellent ; painstaking study 

 of plant growing was reaping its reward. 

 Prices, too, were good and, while figures 

 are obtainable from only the leadin^i; 

 markets, it is probably no more than a 

 statement of fact that frem New Year's 

 to Ea--(er the aggregate money value of 

 cut flower crops throughout the Uniteil 

 States was never greater. At Easter the 

 lilies, because of quantities of indifferent 

 quality, did not do as well as had been 

 expected. Decoration day is gaining a 

 position second only to Christmas and 

 Easter in the cut flower business. 



The growers of flowering plants did a 

 prodigious business for Easter and for 

 the first time since the growth of this 

 branch of the trade became pronounced 

 fully met the needs of retailers in the 

 principal cities. The bedding plantsmen 

 had a splendid season, well-grown stock 

 of all kinds finding a ready outlet at 

 .-satisfactory prices, save in a few scat- 

 tered localities, and had these surpluses 

 been recognized in season there was a 

 place at no great distance for each of 

 them. 



The Fern Market. 



The trade in palms and other deco- 

 rative plants has been steady. The Bos- 

 ton fern was, in the growing season, 

 produced in even greater quantities than 

 before and the market was over-burdened 

 in the fall ; indeed, stocks are still 

 pressing, but the Boston has lost none of 

 its popularity through omnipresence; 

 the plants will all find a home by spring. 

 Another item which is suffering in price 

 by increased production is asparagus, 

 and this applies not only to plants but 

 to the cut stock. The Pierson fern has 

 taken a firm hold on the trade in its 

 first season and the golden pandanus 

 has been widely distributed. 



Builders Have Busy Season. 



During the summer ,the greenhouse 

 builders had a busy season. There is 



this difference in the establishments of 

 the Atlantic coast and of the Ohio and 

 Mississippi valleys; on the one there are 

 many hundreds of moderate-sized and 

 generally very successful places, in the 

 other comparatively few, but many of 

 them very large producers, this spring 

 standing at the close of their most prof- 

 itable season. Is it any wonder that 

 in the east each grower built a house 

 or two and that in the west whole new 

 ranges were the rule? The man was 

 the exception who did not in some par- 

 ticular enlarge his facilities for doing 

 business. 



Yet the summer was a period of inci])- 

 ient hesitancy in the business world. Cost 

 of production was ver_y high and labor 

 troubles were tripping many industricr--. 

 The bellowings from AVall street served 

 to intimidate many merchants and man- 

 ufacturers, for contagious as is the 

 spirit of push, nothing runs riot through 

 the body politic like the fear of famine. 



Autumn Promises Well. 



Starting the season with greenhouses 

 never in better shape, with carnation 

 plants coming in from a splendid out- 



comes, the smaller are the sums taken for 

 each square foot of glass. However 

 time this may be, it does not account for 

 the shortage in crops this fall, for the 

 small places and the large have about 

 the same story to tell. So, too, do reports 

 agree as to results under the many styles 

 of construction ; only the most careful 

 grower has had always the best results. 



Trade Halts. 



Trade has halted perceptibly this fall, 

 but the country at large has not felt the 

 change as have the principal cities, where 

 the microbe of pessimism seems to have 

 inoculated, here and there, a grower who 

 was thought immune. As witness the 

 following from a leading producer for 

 the Philadelphia market: "I never like 

 to carry my mouth in a sling. ' ' he writes, 

 "but without any joking, things are se- 

 rious. Crops have been light and what 

 we have had has brought but little; ir 

 needs one's entire attention to keep one's 

 expenses down and to make the most of 

 it. ' ' Of course this comes from a man 

 who, when he does a thing, never does it 

 by halves. 



The ehrysantheniuni growers did not 

 fare as well as usual, partly for the rea-ii 

 sdn that the warm weather in many sec- 

 tions brought on the bulk of the crop 

 before outdoor flowers were out of the 

 way and in the season of the first cut 

 of roses and carnations. Some splendid 

 novelties were shown at the autumn ex- 

 hibitions and, despite low prices for com- 

 mercial stock, it may be said to have 

 been a wonderful season for the queen 

 of autumn. The violet industry is in 



Store of S. Hoffman, Boston, Just Before Christmas. 



door growing season, with roses showing 

 the benefit of the increasing skill of the 

 growers, it bade fair to be, in the pro- 

 ducing end, at least, the most successful 

 season on record. But from some in- 

 scrutable source has come a curtailment 

 of production as unexpected' as was the 

 slackening in demand. The lack of re- 

 sults has, in some districts been most 

 noticeable in carnations, but there h.ns 

 also been, in many districts, a failure to 

 get the rose crops which one might have 

 iinticipated from early conditions. 



It has often been said, apparently 

 tvith some justice, that generally the 

 larger a greenhouse establishment be- 



a way to sympathize with any one who 

 complains of low prices. In the west 

 Campbell predominates and quality has 

 been poor. In the eastern district Ma- 

 rie Louise is grown, Init the best of 

 stock has not fetched old-time prices. 



New York Hardest Hit. 



New York has suffered more than any 

 other market, for in New York Wall 

 street is the artery through which goes 

 out much of the money to the veins by 

 which it reaches the flower grower, but 

 as the grower is, after the consumer, the 

 foundation stone of our trade structure, 

 so is the farm the source of our national 



