FLOWERS BY AIR FROM HOLLAND TO PARIS

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 6801, 3 January 1929, Page 2

FLOWERS BY AIR FROM HOLLAND TO PARIS

PARIS. No visitor to tins capital but must remark the brilliant patches of colour scattered through the city, clinging to the foot of monument or near the steps of a church, much as a woman brightens a sombre dress with a cluster of jewels. These spots of colour are the flower stalls, rich in scarlet, gold and blue patterns.' Even more vividly as winter approaches and the. leaves fall from the trees, do these splashes of colour stand out. Many will undoubtedly be surprised to know that grcaat numbers of these flowers are picked in the morning in Holland and sold in the afternoon in Paris. They are shipped by airplane. This has gone on since 1923, and the flower growers of France arc beginning to ask themselves why they do not adopt more extensively the methods of th Dutch. Tho sun is not necessary; artificial heat is produced from coal. Beds near Aalsmeer cover nearly 800 acres, tho roses alone-being spread over 100 acres. A- Frenchman has likened this place to a flower-factory, and says that much could be learned-, by the growers' of his country from a study of the gardens of Holland. France prides itself on its flowers. It is indeed a land where the flower is paid great honour. On every possible occasion flowers arc used for decoration. The florists about Paris are numerous and their beds are extensive, so that Holland by no’ means entirely supplies Paris. There must, nevertheless, be some reason back of the Dutch being able to pay the transportation by air and still sell flowers in Paris under the very noses of the French gardeners/ The answer is that the Dutch have developed the use of artificial heat further than the French. In the United States the pansies, for example, arc planted in the spring; but here, in France, the pansies were put in the ground in August, so that they will be at their best in the first months of the-new year. The asters, snapdragons, und poppies arc always popular in Franco in summer; the lilies of the valley and tho daffodils are much bought in the spring, and the yellow mimosa comes up from tho south of France during the winter months. Of all flowers, however, curiously enough the balsamine is sold in largest quantities, and next to it comes the zinnia. The colourful stalls of Paris are constantly filled with a variety of flowers: some front Holland, and the others from near Paris or up from the Riviera.