Genetic Engineering of Flowers
Jacquie Kangas
July 28, 2005
My childhood memories are filled with the fragrance of flowers. Our beautiful tropical garden overflowed with aromatic flowers: yellow mimosa clusters against their dark green leaves, tall lilac and purple stocks, beds of pink aromatic carnations, sweet frangipani trees, a mass of fresh, lilac-blue jacoranda trumpets shading our driveway, sweet flowering tobacco wafting through the night air. Our high school classrooms enclosed courtyard rose gardens. Math and science were tinged with fragrant warm afternoon breezes.
Later we moved to a Canadian city. Long dark winters and small backyards limited any new memories of fragrant flowers. Flower shops were substitutes for gardens, but they were filled with fresh fragrant blends: carnations, roses, lilies, stocks, hyacinths, and freesia, to name a few.
Then it all changed. Today, unfortunately, my experiences of fragrant flowers haven't just moved from a tropical garden to wonderful smelling flower shops; they have gone – committed to memory forever. Not so long ago I regularly bought cut flowers at a cluster of popular flower shops in the tony Yorkville neighbourhood of Toronto. Probably the most popular flower shops in Toronto, the outside stalls overflow with spectacular colours and varieties of blooms. But something is missing. There is absolutely no fragrance wafting in the air – just a papery whiff. It disturbs me so much, I very seldom buy flowers anymore.
Recently, at another flower shop, when ordering some roses to send to a friend, I bemoaned the loss of fragrant flowers. The sales clerk countered that some roses do have a fragrance. When I told her I was talking about all flowers, particularly carnations, she responded with complete surprise. She was astonished to hear that carnations have a fragrance. She was about twenty-six years old.
How have we allowed genetic engineering of flowers to progress so far that young adults today are not even aware that various flowers once had beautiful fragrances? I am told flowers are being altered to increase their size, colour and bloom time. I haven't noticed that cut flowers last any longer, but some varieties do, indeed, come in stunning new colours, but at what expense?
I urge all those that care to become involved. Don't buy flowers, if their fragrance has been removed. Let those who are selling them know why you are not buying them. Spread the word. Be part of a movement. Let's stop this tragic trend in its tracks before it is too late.
Later we moved to a Canadian city. Long dark winters and small backyards limited any new memories of fragrant flowers. Flower shops were substitutes for gardens, but they were filled with fresh fragrant blends: carnations, roses, lilies, stocks, hyacinths, and freesia, to name a few.
Then it all changed. Today, unfortunately, my experiences of fragrant flowers haven't just moved from a tropical garden to wonderful smelling flower shops; they have gone – committed to memory forever. Not so long ago I regularly bought cut flowers at a cluster of popular flower shops in the tony Yorkville neighbourhood of Toronto. Probably the most popular flower shops in Toronto, the outside stalls overflow with spectacular colours and varieties of blooms. But something is missing. There is absolutely no fragrance wafting in the air – just a papery whiff. It disturbs me so much, I very seldom buy flowers anymore.
Recently, at another flower shop, when ordering some roses to send to a friend, I bemoaned the loss of fragrant flowers. The sales clerk countered that some roses do have a fragrance. When I told her I was talking about all flowers, particularly carnations, she responded with complete surprise. She was astonished to hear that carnations have a fragrance. She was about twenty-six years old.
How have we allowed genetic engineering of flowers to progress so far that young adults today are not even aware that various flowers once had beautiful fragrances? I am told flowers are being altered to increase their size, colour and bloom time. I haven't noticed that cut flowers last any longer, but some varieties do, indeed, come in stunning new colours, but at what expense?
I urge all those that care to become involved. Don't buy flowers, if their fragrance has been removed. Let those who are selling them know why you are not buying them. Spread the word. Be part of a movement. Let's stop this tragic trend in its tracks before it is too late.
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