Horticulture << HAWR tuh `kuhl` chuhr >> is the art and science of growing plants, particularly garden plants. Horticulture includes gardening and landscaping as well as the commercial growing of flowers, fruits, herbs, nuts, and vegetables. The word horticulture comes from the Latin words hortus, meaning garden, and cultura, meaning culture or cultivation.
Horticulture has played a crucial role in the development of civilization. The large-scale agricultural production of food plants and other crops developed from small-scale gardening activities. Horticulture and agriculture supported the first permanent human settlements, which gave rise to the first cities. Today, horticulture is both a scientifically and technologically advanced global industry and a popular hobby enjoyed by people around the world.
The horticulture industry
can be divided into four branches. They are: (1) floriculture, (2) olericulture, (3) pomology, and (4) landscape and ornamental horticulture.
Floriculture
is the production of flowers and leafy, decorative foliage plants. People use flowers and foliage plants for decoration and often give them as gifts.
Olericulture
is the growing of edible herbaceous (nonwoody) plant crops, such as asparagus and tomatoes. Olericulture differs from agriculture largely in the scale of production. Sugar beets and wheat, for example, are so important and widespread that their growth is considered agriculture.
Pomology
deals with shrubs, trees, and vines raised for their fruit and nuts. Viniculture, a specialized area of pomology, involves the production of grapes for use in making wine.
Landscape and ornamental horticulture
involves the growth of such decorative plants as shrubs, trees, and turf. These plants are commonly used around buildings and highways and in yards, parks, golf courses, and sports stadiums.
Horticulture as a hobby.
For most of human history, people practiced horticulture primarily as a means of growing food for their families and communities. Today, many people enjoy planting and arranging flowers and raising gardens as leisure activities. The horticulture industry supports such activities by selling flowers and other plants to gardening enthusiasts.
Research in horticulture
primarily addresses the needs of the industry. Some horticulturists study ways to improve the transportation, storage, and processing of cultivated plants. Others study how to improve the nutritional value of food crops and increase their yields.
Horticulturists modify plants by selective breeding—that is, they carefully select and pair certain plants to produce offspring with desirable characteristics. Horticulturalists also improve plants using genetic engineering, techniques that alter an organism’s hereditary material. Many horticultural plants have been modified so much by selective breeding that they depend on human beings to survive. For example, seedless grapes are easier to eat, but such grapevines can no longer reproduce in the same way as their wild relatives.
To maximize production, the horticulture and agriculture industries have become increasingly standardized, limiting the genetic diversity of the plants that are grown. Much of our current food supply, for example, consists of only a few highly specialized crop breeds. Scientists have developed gene banks to store seeds and other material from a diverse range of plant species. These materials help preserve crucial information about plants that are no longer cultivated or that could one day go extinct. They also provide raw materials to breed new kinds of crops if current crops fail.
