If you have been wondering what horticulture means now is the right time to find out. Probably you have seen this word mentioned in different magazines dedicated to gardening or have heard about it when it comes to different organizations related to gardening.

After a ‘horticulturist’ means a person with gardening and anything that has something to do with plants and their cultivation, then one would say that it is nothing different than the world ‘gardener’.

And he won’t be far from the truth. The conclusion that logically comes into mind is that the only difference between a horticulturist and a gardener is the fancy title. But this leads to much more essential difference- horticulture is one of those jobs that you really enjoy doing but you get paid for it.

While the only reward for a gardener is seeing his garden thriving and the flowers blooming, the horticulturist gets paid in money.

So now you know that horticulture by its very definition is the cultivation of a garden, and it is a dilemma whether you should say that it is the science or the art of cultivation of vegetables, fruits, plants, and flowers.

And when we say ‘horticultural plant’ we mean a plant  that has been produced by cultivation unlike the ones that have grown without the intervention of a person taking care of it.

And let us look into the linguistic aspect of the word ‘horticulture’. It is a combination between two Latin words.

The first part – ‘hortus’ means a garden plant and ‘cultura’, as you can guess stands for ‘culture’. As a profession horticulture ranges from industry, to government and educational institutions, from wholesale and retail businesses, to propagators and plant breeders, thus involving many different types of careers.

But basically there are five main areas of horticulture. The first one is Landscape horticulture, dealing with the production and maintenance of landscape plants. The other one is Floriculture which has as an object the marketing and production of flowers.

Next is Olericulture involved in vegetables cultivation, Pomology, based on the cultivation, production, and marketing of fruits and the last one is Postharvest physiology which has to solve the problems connected with the promotion of crop quality, and reduction of overall spoilage for all crops.

Now that you know the difference between gardening and horticulture you might want to be more than a gardener – why not a horticulturist? And the good news is that this can come true without any hassle because there are always classes on horticulture that you could attend and meet a lot of like-minded souls that will share your interest and passion for gardening…or horticulture?