NATIVE FLORA

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVI, Issue 110, 9 April 1926, Page 7

NATIVE FLORA

INCREASING OUR KNOWLEDGE

THROUGH BOTANICAL GARDENS.

USE FOR SCANDIA STREET DOMAIN.

For some time past the New Zealand Society of Horticulture has been interesting itself in the cultivationj preservation, propagation and collection of our native flora, realising that some of it is fast becoming extremely rare and that New Zealanders generally. are lamentably deficient in appreciation of its beauty. Recently Mr F. J. Nathan, as president of the New Zealand Society of Horticulture, together with Dr Cockayne and Mr Waugh (the last-named representing tho N.Z. Association of Nurserymen), waited upon the reserves committee of tho Wellington City Council with a request that it should set aside one of its reserves, preferably Wilton’s bush, for tho establishment of a botanical garden which would be composed purely of New Zealand flora.

“It was pointed out by tho deputation,” stated Mr Nathan to a “Standard” reporter this morning, “that, unless some steps were taken in the near future, tlioro was a grave danger of losing much of the beautiful native flora of this country, some of which is already becoming extremely rare. It was pointed out, too. that there was a serious lack of knowledge on the part of both young and adult New Zealanders of tho plants of this country and that, altogether, it was eminently desirable that these plants should bo collected, grown under the best possible conditions, and made available for inspection when they would be a source of interest and admiration not only to our own people but to visitors to New Zealand.” NATIONAL GARDEN IMPOSSIBLE.

It was realised, Mr Nathan added, that one national botanical garden dealing with native flora alone was impracticable for tho reason that plants from, say, the North Island, when transplanted to 'the South Island, would in the course of a few years lose their characteristics, and that was most undesirable.

It was hoped, therefore, to induce tho city council and the more important borough councils of the Dominion, the former in a large and the latter in a smaller way, to establish their own botanical gardens dealing purely with native flora.

The Wellington City Council’s reserves committeo met tho deputation most favourably and the council will discuss the suggestion at its next meeting. PALMERSTON NORTH’S PART. In the interim the local council of the N.Z. Society of Horticulture is taking active measures to have its suggestion carried into effect at Palmerston North and the reserves committee here will bo approached with a suggestion that tho tecandia street reserve, which Hokowhitu residents desire tho council to put in order as a park, playground or gardens, bo utilised for the purposes of a pure New Zealand flora reserve. Tho Esplanade, Mr Nathan commented, was not suitable, for it contained chiefly exotic plants and he emphasised tho idea of creating in the main centres areas devoted purely to the collection and propagation of our native flora.

It was not generally known, said Mr Nathan, that there wore some 150 varieties of tree ferns, and that the kauri and pohutukawa could be successfully grown in Palmerston North. Enthusiasts in residential garden adornment, too, often overlooked the merits of totara and thousand jacket as hedge plants. Such knowledge was but a tithe of that which could be gained from a properly established native botanical garden with tho plants duly classified for tho practical instruction of school children and any adult 3 who interested themselves in the matter. Only too often we disregarded the esteem in which the beauties of our indigenous Hora was held by visitors from overseas and it was fitting that the coming generation at least should have a better appreciation of this national asset.

The next step, once native botanical gardens were established in the centres, would be the training, through a chair of horticulture at the universities, of men and women in the art and science of horticultural gardens. That, Mr Nathan pointed out, would be of great valuo to local bodies 'and others requiring expert liorticulturalists. At tho prosent time most of the head gardeners in the Dominion came from Kew and it took them a year or two to become thoroughly conversant with Dominion conditions, while, of course, they lacked a knowledge of New Zealand flora and which it was so earnestly desired to disseminate.