What do we even do???? Everyone who has gone to school at Delhi has definitely seen us walking around campus with our professor stopping and staring at all the trees we pass, and you might wonder, what the heck are we doing? Here's a little secret -- we do a lot actually, and it's all pretty cool stuff if you ever get the chance to talk to us in between plant walks or green house work.
Horticulture.....
By the sound of it, some of you might think that's the study of something very different and extremely unrelated! No, it's not whore-ticulture, very funny though, I've only heard that seven thousand times since I started school. Horticulture is the art and science that goes behind growing plants! Exciting right? I know waiting for a plant to grow may sound like watching paint dry, but there are some very cool things that we do! You'd be surprised, maybe even consider buying a plant? Who knows.
Bonsai, those little Japanese trees you see in nail salons? We can do that, if we have about 40 years of time to devote to a single plant. Bonsai is an art form, started in Japan way back when, but it practices one's patience. Bonsai is more of a descriptive term, so you actually can create a bonsai version of just about any species of tree in the world! In a simple explanation, bonsai artists use wires and other tools to help shape the tree as it grows into a work of art. They have to constantly cut it down until the bark thickens up and it becomes a mature tree that stands anywhere from 4 inches to 5 feet tall! It's a living and constantly changing piece of artwork -- pretty cool if you ask me!
Horticulturists are the spearheads of the green rush, as I'm calling it. If you haven't noticed, the recent changes in a lot of state laws means that marijuana legalization is expected to become a radically growing industry. Whether medical or recreational, someone's gotta make that green. Hey, I guess it's us, and I'm not complaining. Until more states legalize the production and selling of marijuana, every hippie-head horticulturist, like myself, will dream of moving out to Colorado or California to work in a Marijuana green house. It seems like the perfect life. And until the growth of the industry plateaus workers will be making quite the pay check, some of them up to $200,000 a year!
Plants are cool people!! So start asking questions! What's that pretty pink flower? How do those trees get so damn tall? You'll start to grow (haha get it?) an appreciation for the world around you, and hey, you might actually enjoy putting your iPhone down for a second.
