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January 5, 1911. 



The Weekly Florists' Review. 



11 



Harry A. Bvnyard. 



ject in an exhaustive msuiner, for fear 

 that 1 might fail in the attempt. 



With your permission, 1 will read a 

 letter which a|»peared a few months 

 ago in one of our trade [>apers. It 

 read: "Can you tell me what is the 

 matter with my violets f T am enclos- 

 ing a few leaves, and if you can give 

 me any information regarding them, it 

 will be appreciated. 1 have a green- 

 house, 22x7(1, chiefly in violets, and 

 there is something wrong with them. 

 We also have our sweet peas in the 

 same house, and I uin, enclosing some 

 of them. They are not doing as well 

 as they might. Will you tell me what 

 to do with them .' 1 am located in 

 eastern Missouri.'" And this from a 

 citizen of Missouri, who, according to 

 the popular belief, should have been 

 "shown" before he undertook the 

 growing of violets and sweet peas — not 

 after! 1 need hardly add that the 

 Missourian in question represents a 

 type not at all uncommon among us. 



The Vital Point. 



The question has often been asked: 

 Are we tradesmen or professionals? 

 If I remember rightly, a paper on this 

 subject has been read and debated in 

 our own club. This question had often 

 occurred also to me, as it has to many 

 others, and the answer, if we pause 

 long enough to consider it from every 

 conceivable viewpoint, leads invariably 

 to a counter question, namely: What 

 does it matter — trarlesmen or profes- 

 sionals? 



The mere classification of a business 

 — and a business it is with all of us — 



can neither enhance nor detract from 

 its true merit. What should really con- 

 cern us most is: Are we competent, 

 efficient and well equipped to under- 

 take an important work, and make a 

 success of it without altogether trust- 

 ing in our lucky stars? The Missourian 

 who made a failure of his violets and 

 sweet peas, and can not even tell what 

 "ails them," might as well have under- 

 taken the construction of an aeroplane 

 or the prejjaration of a brief in an 

 imi)ortant case before the Supreme 

 ('ourt. The results, to be sure, would 

 have proven equally unsatisfactory, 

 ('an we imagine, for a moment, a com- 

 petent machinist, a cabinet-maker, or 

 an attorney or a physician doing his 

 work on the mere assumption that if 

 he does ' ' not succeed, he must try and 

 try again''? Hardly. And yet this is 

 l>reci8ely the method employed by many 

 and many a man in the florists' trade or 

 l)rofession. 



A Wovad-be Florist. 



"The florists' business looke<l mighty 

 good to me," remarked an ex-coal 

 dealer in a western town, one day, to 

 me. "I sold out my business," he 

 continued, "and built a range of six 

 houses. Not knowing a thing about 

 growing, I engaged a man who claimed 

 he knew it all, with the result that I 

 lost heavily the first season. The sea- 

 son following. T hired another fellow, a 

 carnation grower, and planted four of 

 my houses with carnations and two 

 with miscellaneous bedding stock. As 

 bad luck would have it, we had a dry 

 season, the plants made poor growth 

 in the field, and when benched they 



began to wilt and to stem-rot. Neither 

 of us knew what to do about it. 

 Another failure stared me in the face, 

 but I was determined to make the best 

 of it, and so put in a batch of lettuce 

 to help pay for the coal at least, let 

 alone money -making. Well, sir," con- 

 cluded the would-be florist, ' ' if you 

 know of anj'body looking for green- 

 houses, please send him around. I'll 

 sell out cheap. ' ' 



Now, here is a case of a man who, 

 because the florists' business looked 

 good to him, did not at all hesitate to 

 dispose of his coal business and to em- 

 bark in something he did not know 

 anything about. 



Can we imagine a carpet-weaver or a 

 doctor undertaking his respective work 

 without any training, but simply be- 

 cause the carpet business or the medi- 

 cal profession looked good to him? 

 Hardly. But horticulture, evidently, 

 puts no obstacles in the way of the 

 novice. On the contrary, it seems to 

 allure coal dealers, carpenters, machin- 

 ists, clerks, and, if I may change 

 Dante's verse, it invites all — "All hope 

 cherish, y*" who enter here. ' ' Men, and 

 women too, who know no more about 

 flower or plant culture than they do 

 about bridge building, often embark 

 unha^itatr-igly in the florists' business, 

 tTUSung to mere pluck or luck, with the 

 result, as might be expected, of failure 

 in the end. 



Boom for More Experts. 



The thought has often occurred to 

 me that but few professions or trades, 

 if any, are being conducted on the "hit 

 or miss" principle to so great an ex- 

 tent as is the florists' business. To be 

 sure, we have competent and able 

 growers everywhere. We can point to 

 men who have achieved success because 

 of their ability and foresight. There 

 are rose growers, carnation growers, 

 plantsmen, specialists in every branch, 

 many of whom are well known to all 

 of us. But such men, we must admit, 

 constitute but a handful as compared 

 with the number of incompetents. J 

 will hazard the assertion that for every 

 successful carnation or rose grower, tor 

 every man who knows not only how to 

 do things, but why and when to do 

 them as well, there are dozens, at least, 

 who grope in the dark, who know 

 nothing about soils, about the use and 

 abuse of fertilizers, about the require 

 ments of plants, about the proper han- 

 dling of bulbs and seeds — who, in brief, 

 are utterly unfit for the work they arc 

 doing. My own observations, during 

 nearly a quarter of a century of road 

 life, among all classes and conditions 

 of florists, have led me lo but one con- 

 clusion, and that is, that our business, 

 notwithstanding the tremendous prog- 

 ress it has made, lacks in those funda- 

 mental elements which are so necessary 

 in order to insure its permanent, 

 healthy growth. The florist who makes 

 a failure of his roses, for example, and 

 cannot diagnose the cause of the fail- 

 ure in order to apply the remedy, or 

 to nip the very failure in the bud, 

 proves conclusively that he had not 

 studied his trade or profession. In 

 other words, he has not the theoretical 

 knowledge or scientific basis upon 

 which to work out his practical results. 



The Hit or Miss Principle. 



On the other hand, the man who 

 makes a success of his plants and is 



rContlnaed on pajre 32.] 



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