BUYING PLANTS

Evening Post, Volume LXXX, Issue 4, 5 July 1910, Page 9

BUYING PLANTS

ALLEGED UNFAIR COMPETITION. Amateur garCeners and tree-planters have a grievance against the Superintendent of the City Reserve* (Mr G i<. Glen) in that he bids at the auction markets for nursery stock on behalf of tae Reserves Committee One ardent suburban horticulturist put the grievance to a Post, reporter as f ollows : — "The superintendent 'has no right to run up prices by competing with private citizens m the public markets for plants for the city reserves." He considered that the private individual had his part in the beautification. of the city by making the rock bloom and the bare hillside clothe itself in green shrubs and bushes. If, however, the ratepayers' money was used to run up prices in the auction market, well, private citizens could not compete and their gardens would suffer. He thought the superintendent should deal directly with the nurseries and leave the markets alone. Some intending bidders would not stay when they saw Mr. Glen enter into competition. - The complaint was laid before Mr. Glen, who produced catalogues of nursery stock and also the invoice of ti© plants he had purchased at a, recent auction. The total amount of the stock purchased was only £3 13s. The price of each particular species of plant was given as paid for in the auction market, and as catalogued in the Nurseryman's Catalogue. Here are a few examples (the first figures are the auction prices, the scond the catalogue prices) : — Euonymus (8d), Is to 2s 6d ; wistaria (9d), 2s 6d; azalea indica (9d), Is 6d to 2s 6d; camellia (Is 3d), 2s to 10s 6d ; diosma (Is 2d), Is 6d to 2s 6d ; lassandra (9d), Is 6d to 2s 6d ; agapanthus (Id), Is 6d to 2s; robusta, (sd), Is to 3s 6d; berberis (Is Id), Is to 2s 6d; holly (7d), 6d to 2s 6d ; ligusbrum (4d), 6d to 2s 6d ; roses (5d and 7d), Is to 2s 6d ; abies (sd), Is to 2s 6d ; palms (da), Is upwards; muckaya (sd), Is 6d to 2s; kaultussia (Is sd), rare plant, not catalogued; boronia (Is), Is 6d to 3s 6d; eleagnus (2s 6d bundle of twenty), 3s to 5s a bundle of twelve ; vitex (puriri) (Is 6d), 2s to 2s 6d; totara (9d), Is 6d to 2s 6d; olearia (6d), Is to 2s 6d; cordylene (xs 4d), 2s to 2s 6d ; griselinia (8d), Is 6d to 2s 6d. • \ Mr. Glen pointed out that to have purchased the nursery stock at catalogued prices direct from nurserymen would have cost far more than twice as much as buying at auction, and -with tho reduced allowance for the reserves, the money must be made to go as far as pobsible. Mr. Glen further pointed out that the prices had not been run up very high as compared with the amounts charged by nurserymen.