plant regulation-Trivial-and OT

totototo@telus.net totototo@telus.net
Tue, 28 Jul 2009 17:44:37 PDT
On 28 Jul 2009, at 15:18, Robert Pries wrote:

> plant societies are appearing to be on the way out if you look at membership.
> If their members are not a bit more generous in welcoming the less informed
> they can soon be talking to the wall. 

The malaise is much more deeply rooted than that. We live in a society centered 
on immediate gratification and gardening is NOT that. It takes time and EFFORT 
and sticktoitiveness to learn the ins and outs of any one branch of 
horticulture, and that's precisely what the younger generation isn't willing to 
supply.

Modern uninformed types want knowledge and expertise handed to them on a silver 
platter, want to be spoonfed what others only learned by paying close attention 
for decades, but that's not the way you learn to grow plants or arrange a 
garden. You learn those by getting your hands dirty, making lots of mistakes, 
and killing lots of plants in the process.

Another element in the gradual decline of gardening societies is that 
gardening, as a hobby, has a great deal more competition these days than it did 
when we old fossils were first hatched from pterodactyl eggs. Why go out and 
spray the aphids when you can be self-actualizing in the nearest mall or big 
box store, or finding enlightenment at the foot of your latest guru?

Even if they go hiking in the mountains, they pay next to no attention to the 
floral beauties they pass.


The Master Gardener program has been mentioned in passing. Perhaps it's a 
heresy that will lead to me being burnt as part of an enormous horticultural 
auto da fe, but I think that program is a con, a fake, a scam. All it teaches 
is how to look something up in books! Those who emerge from the progam tend to 
think "now I know everything" when in fact they should emerge with a sense of 
how little they know.


Harumph! Young whipper-snappers!


-- 
Rodger Whitlock
Victoria, British Columbia, Canada
Maritime Zone 8, a cool Mediterranean climate
on beautiful Vancouver Island

http://maps.google.ca/maps/…


More information about the pbs mailing list