HORTICULTURE INSTITUTE

Waikato Independent, Volume XXIII, Issue 3150, 13 December 1923, Page 6

HORTICULTURE INSTITUTE

REDUCED APRICOT VARIETIES.

OTHER. WORK IN VIEW. A reduction in the number of Ibe varieties of commercial apricots lias been effected By flic Xew Zealand Institute of Horticulture, Inc., which should become to JS'ew Zealand what the Royal Horticultural .Society is to England. Mr Goo. A. Green, .secretary of the New Zealand Association of Nurserymen, told this to a Tarannki Herald reporter, as an instance uf the valuable work that the institute could accomplish. A. committee working at Roxburgh had reduced from more than 20 to six the number of varieties of apricots it would recommend to growr ers. More than 26,000 buds of these six varieties had been supplied to nurserymen throughout New Zealand for propagating. Fully SO per cent of the apricot trees sold in 192 M had been raised from these varieties, and it had been estimated that 90 per cent of the trees now growing in the nurseries hud been raised similarly. Besides this and similar activities, another clvss of work the institute had in view was educational. Mr Green proceeded. It was hoped to secure the establishment of a school of horticulture and ultimately n chair at one nr more of the university colleges. A. union of all horticultural societies in New Zealand, weu'd enable many reforms to be made which would popularise horticultural shows. Among the reforms desirable were the establishment of a national Judges' register, a national judges' conference at which rules would be adopted to become binding on affiliated societies, the standardisation of show schedules, and the avoidance of overlapping of show dates. ~ .. ' , The constitution also provided for the establishing of a board or.boards of nomenclature to deal with penological and other sections of plant, nomenclature. For 80 years trees and plants had been imported from various countries and it was only natural that a certain amount of confusion should have arisen as to the correct naming. This could be remedied only by a competent, authority, working in conjunction with similar authorities in Britain and other parts of the world.