GARDENING AT SEA

Greymouth Evening Star, 30 October 1931, Page 8

GARDENING AT SEA

WORK ON LINER. Most people may wonder how the great Atlantic liners obtain their supplies of fresh flowers which charm passengers while out at sea. Atlantic steamers carry a staff of gardeners who tend conservatories and cultivate garden shrubs, exotic plants, and blossoming vines as successfully as on land (says “Popular Gardening”). Flowers for sea voyages are selected from home and foreign ports. At New York, for instance, the head gardener makes out a list of his requirements, which is cabled home to Southampton, Bremen, or Havre, as the case my be. These will await him on the ship’s return, ready to diffuse their fragrance on the next west-bound voyage. For the immediate return journey he buys his needs in New York and the flowers are delivered as near to sailing time as possible, so that they will be fresh and blooming when the great steamer lifts anchor. A gardener’s job at sea is no sinecure. Every morning he makes a

round of the ship, removes faded blossoms, sprays ferns, devises new colour harmonies, and fresh-waters all flowers- Scarlet azaleas, purple hyacinths, and delicate roses all require the expert’s care. They need petting and a knowledge of their peculiarities if they are to bloom at their brightest. Some need more attention than others, but the most delicate of all and the hardest to keep fresh are gardenias, first favourites' with the ladies. The ocean gardener has to work quickly. He must plan his decorative effects, with little oportunity to change his colour schemes should a happier idea present itself. For instance, a head gardener on a worjdfamous liner once had to arrange 120 vases of flowers for the dining saloon, and sixty similar bouquets for the deck grill in less than one hour and ahalf. Even in flowers, however, fashions change. In the old days, carnations and roses were the only decorative blossoms to be seen on board ship. Today you will see almost every variety of lily, cyclamen, cynara, rhododendron, and hyacinth. Often when in

port you may -sec a ship’s gardener peering anxiously into the windows of city florists in search of new ideas.