FLORIDA CHRYSANTHEMUMS 
TO BE BIG BUSINESS 
(Reprinted from The Stuart News) 
Want a day in June in January? Or a 
short September day in May? Martin 
County flower growers can make a day 
of any length for you at any time of year. 
With Heteancs of electric lights for ar- 
tificial suns concentrated on Retr acres, 
they bring the lazy days of Summer to 
mid-winter. Or, using black cloth for 
shade, they make night come early in 
the Spring. 
And this new magic of manufacturing 
days of any length at any time is luring 
some of the most successful Northect 
florists to Stuart and Martin County. 
Because half a dozen local men have 
pioneered the industry, producing asters 
and chrysanthemums under regulated 
light conditions, without the use of ex- 
pensive greenhouses, some of the largest 
wholesale flower producers in the nation 
are buying land here and making plans 
FLOWERS UNDER LIGHTS LURE NORTHERN 
Long-stemmed asters growing in midwinter under electric lights, 
a center for winte production of asters and chrysanthemums. 
which may cause this to be the Chrysan- 
themum Center of the nation. 
“They're gravitating to the spot where 
successful production has been tested and 
established,” according to Paul Hoenshel, 
veteran South Florida agriculturalist. 
Aster production under artificial light 
was initiated here by Frank Liberty on 
the Backus Plantation 12 years ago. The 
lights are used to extend the day, so that 
the asters will have long stems. But that 
discovery, according to Hoenshel, is “small 
potatoes” compared to a recent new de- 
parture involving chrysanthemums. 
Here the wrinkle is to lengthen the day 
with artificial light to cause the “mums” 
to grow like sixty, then start shortening 
the days, and abruptly turn off the lights. 
The “mums” are grown in slat-houses un- 
der cloth. To simulate the shortest days 
of fall, black cloth shades are used to 
make the plants respond to even shorter 
days than those in Florida’s Spring. 
“Quality of these chrysanthemums has 
topped those produced in Northern green- 
FLORISTS 
—Coutant Photo 
like these on the Paul Hoenshel 
acre inside Stuart’s city limits, are luring Northern greenhouse men to Martin County, rapidly becoming 
More than 200,000 blooms were picked 
and shipped from this planting from December to mid-April and cutting will go on until June 1. 
