“At least he cuts it up into stove lengths,” Grandfather Thurnow, quoted by Paul Hiebert (1947). And, lo and behold, that is what is happening to horticulture in Canada.
Plantsman Terry McGlade told trade magazine Landscape Ontario: “People don’t interact with their gardens anymore. They are interested in patios, open space and outdoor televisions. You see it in the evolution of Canada Blooms. Ten years ago the feature gardens were half plants and half landscape, now they are 20 per cent plants and 80 per cent hard surfaces.”
Perhaps tellingly, McGlade was interviewed by a trade publication that had decided to change its name late last year from Horticulture Review to Landscape Ontario. And, as McGlade observed, today landscaping implies hard materials: patios, decks, fences, retaining walls, lighting, built-in irrigation and more. These make money; plants do not. Worse, plants require knowledge and skills rarely taught budding landscape architects. And, unlike hard materials, they can die within days.
Just what is the cost to the über-consumer? Fond thoughts of that new deck and patio costing a couple of thousand are dashed by professional contractors. Landscaping the home – 80 per cent hard materials, remember? – is to be estimated at 10 per cent of its value, according to industry sources. And that’s law-balling it. Expect to pay more, perhaps much more, for anything more elaborate.
Historically, early landscape designers of 18th-century England were known as ‘landskip gardeners.’ By the mid-19th-century things had changed. No longer was it necessary to have formal training in ornamental horticulture, architecture and engineering. In 1857, New York City hired a 35-year-old failed farmer and businessman, journalist, and former sailor, Frederick Law Olmsted, to create Central Park.
Today, many a university features a school of landscape architecture, a socially acceptable profession unlike the less-than socially acceptable occupation of plantsman or horticulturist. Alas, many a graduate in the proud profession is reduced by lack of work to slogging it out in the field, physically installing designs produced by their more fortunate brethren.
In days gone by, recessions were boom times for the horticultural industry. Lacking the ability to pay for exotic vacations, people perforce had to stay home and enjoy their garden. Encouraged by green opportunities, landscape contractors were to be seen here, there and everywhere installing gardens with a modest additions of hard materials. Now the same professionals are reportedly finding it more lucrative to move into new subdivisions and commercial contracts.
Recent Australian experiences may offer a return to the garden as just that. According to The Sydney Morning Herald, the demand is down for decks, patios and other “hard” features. What sells a house is green, and lots of it. Perhaps you should be looking for somebody with dirt under their fingernails rather than portfolio-wielding landscape architect. Could be a plantsman like Terry McGlade.
Wes Porter is a horticultural consultant and writer based in Toronto. Wes has over 40 years of experience in both temperate and tropical horticulture from three continents.
