Horticulture

Includes professional commercial sites

Amateur gardening is in Home:Gardens

Horticulture as a science is in Science:Agriculutre and may later be moved to Science:Agriculture and Forestry:Horticulture

Horticulture is the culture of gardens, both as a science and as a practice. Derived from the Anglo-Saxon gyrdan, to enclose, the garden is a relatively small area cultivated intensively to produce fruit plants, vegetables, and ornamentals. The scope of horticulture is expanded greatly in the 21st century to include among crop plants all fleshy edible fruits, green leaves and stems eaten as vegetables, and all ornamental crops with the possible exception of turfgrasses under some conditions involving production in large extensive areas.

Comparison with other areas of plant science
(agronomy, field crops, forestry, and range management)

Agronomy

Agronomy (including Field Crops and Soils) is the science of field crop production. Derived from the Old English feld akin to the Dutch veld field crops are produced in large open areas and less intensively than in gardens. Derived from the medieval northern European usage, field crops include sources of food carbohydrates and cellulose for people and animals. They include the cereal grains (wheat, rye, etc.), pastures (both grasses and legumes), and certain root crops such as the potato which was not introduced into cultivation in Europe until after the discovery of the New World.

While we refer here to agronomy as a science including soil science and crop science, "field crops" is the best term to refer to the plants studied in agronomy, because essentially anything harvested is a crop.

Forestry and Range Management

The third area of applied plant science, forestry and range management includes plants (and animals) which grow in large ecosystems not usually cropped on an annual basis, including uncleared or partially cleared areas with mixed resources of plants and animals. Multiple uses of such areas are common, including outdoor recreation. Fisheries is sometimes considered part of forestry.

Food plants: Horticulture, or Agronomy, or Forestry and Range?

Virtually all crops producing fleshy edible fruits belong in horticulture as either fruit crops or vegetables. They include the traditional temperate berries (tomato), pepoes (cucurbits), hesperidia (citrus), drupes (stone crops such as peach), pomes (apples), and a wide variety of tropical fruits. Even crops with dry fruits such as legumes (garden pea) belong in horticulture when they are harvested and consumed in the fresh undehisced immature stage, whereas otherwise the dry fruits (e.g., common bean) belong in field crops when they are harvested dry as "grains." All crops producing fleshy edible leaves and stems (e.g., vegetable greens such as spinach) also belong in horticulture, except plants producing primarily carbohydrate in large areas (e.g., sugar crops such as sugarbeet and sugarcane) are field crops. Forage plants eaten by animals (e.g., pastures, paddocks, silage, green hay, and green chop) are normally part of agronomy, except when they are produced in large ecosystems they are considered part of range management.

Terrestrial non-food plants: Horticulture, Agronomy, or Forestry and Range?

Cultivated plants which are not food for people or animals can be classified in either horticulture or agronomy or forestry, depending on the intensity of cultivation, the family of plant, and historical precedent. Ornamental plants are always in horticulture except when they are produced extensively in large areas (turfgrass seed and sod, and highway and conservation grasses) in which case they are normally considered in agronomy not horticulture. However, plants usually native plants which are grown in preserves are part of forestry. Forestry also includes trees cut for lumber and pulp wood (as well as outdoor recreation management and wildlife management). Plants producing industrial products such as non-edible oils, resins, non-edible fibers, latexes, and dyes are often in agronomy, with exceptions. The more extensively produced crops such as crambe and flax (linseed oil is used both as a drying oil in paint and as an edible oil in some developing areas) are in agronomy. The more intensively produced crops such as Jojoba are in horticulture. Plants used for conservation such as embankment stabilization, restoration of damaged habitats, and wildflowers used along highways could be classified in either agronomy, horticulture, or forestry, depending on the situation. The grasses would normally belong in agronomy, the amenity plants in horticulture, and plants used in extensive areas, especially in forests, would normally belong in forestry.

Aquatic non-food plants

If a plant is an Embryophyte including Spermatopsida (seed plants: flowering plants, conifers, etc.) as well as hornworts and ferns then it is classified in horticulture, agronomy, or forestry according to the intensity of its cultivation. If a plant is an algae (including seagrasses) then it may not normally be included in field crops, horticulture, or forestry. Instead, the tendency is to include it in Science:Biology:Ecology.