Bright Spots in Winter Some ethnobotanical sleuthing on the streets of New York City
K. W. Bridges
Bright Spots in Winter 2017 Š K. W. Bridges
This is a short, illustrated story about discovering Ranunculus being sold in the New York City Flower District. The trip to NYC was short; we arrived February 23rd and left on the 27th, 2017. Therefore, treat the conclusions as tentative. Enjoy the original photos (Sony RX1R II).
Bright Spots in Winter Some ethnobotanical sleuthing on the streets of New York City Nancy and I like to visit New York City. We’re urban junkies. The diversity and energy of the city is something that we really enjoy. There are lots of opportunities for deep cultural experiences. Museums, monuments, parks, and gardens are just a few of the attractions that draw us back to this city. City dwellers in temperate climates endure winter. The elements of nature that soften the environment, like street trees and hanging flower baskets, are missing during this cold season. I was curious if we could see evidence of how NYC residents respond to the harshness of winter. My suspicion is that these urban dwellers use flowers. We don’t have much time to observe. Mostly, this is something we’ll do as we walk the city streets.
Many of the NYC streets are lined with tall trees. Now, while winter still has its grip on the city, the trees are bare. The leaves are gone. The green canopy over the streets won’t return for a month or so. The parks have little green.
Our focus is on cut flowers. These are the sort of flowers that are purchased locally and brought to an indoor environment. Cut flowers bring color into an environment. Bright red, intense yellow, shocking pink and a host of other colors draw attention to themselves in a positive way. That’s often the goal. Flowers provide a focal point that is both beautiful and organic. A reminder of life. Walk down the NYC streets and you’ll often find a place to buy flowers. These are the flower stalls outside a bodega. A bodega is a distinctly NYC enterprise. These are a type of grocery or convenience store. Bodegas are common in NYC, particularly on street corners. Bodega flowers are held in plastic buckets arranged on stadium-style shelves. These floral displays bring a splash of color to the intersection. You see the expected flower species in these neighborhood locations. Roses, carnations, lilies, and the like. The flowers probably come from abroad so there isn’t much seasonality expressed in the selection.
A bodega bouquet is a convenient and relatively inexpensive purchase. Bodegas ordinarily don’t have refrigeration so they depend on a fast turnover of the flowers. Low price is an attraction. The bodega flower stalls are colorful and obvious streetside attractions in many neighborhoods. Each floral display provides a reminder to stop and purchase some flowers to take home. The bodega vendors purchase their flowers from the wholesale markets. These flower wholesalers are located in Manhattan, but also in the surrounding areas including New Jersey.
There is a concentration of wholesale flower stores in the one-block length of 28th Street between 6th and 7th Avenues. This is just a short walk from Penn Station. These flower stores are collectively called the Flower District. You know that you’ve arrived at the correct place because the sidewalks are filled, on both sides, with plants. Many plants are tall trees or shrubs. Some stores have tall bunches of branches loaded with buds. This sidewalk location is where you see lots of potted plants. You can look into the windows and see the colorful cut flowers that are the specialty of many of the stores. A few stores are mostly green; these shops are a jungle of huge, tightly-packed, indoor plants. The stores open early, at 5 AM or soon thereafter, for the wholesale customers. This isn’t a good time for a novice tourist to be competing with the serious buyers. We waited until after 8 AM. We quickly learned that you need to be brave. Walk in and look around. If you are lucky, you’ll even meet the store’s cat. Every flower store has one.
I expected to see a larger version of a bodega flower shop in these Flower District stores. There is some similarity between a few of the shops and a typical bodega. Lots of buckets of roses (in all colors), for example. Rows of buckets up on a shelf with lilies. But mostly, that isn’t the case. The first shop that we entered showed us what is different. There is much more variety. Mostly the same species. But here, in this Flower District shop, there are many more colors of each of the species. Many of the cut flowers in this store, as well as in the other Flower District shops, are stacked along the side walls. The arrangement looks like an artist’s palette. This is much more interesting than a bodega. Here, the full spectrum of floral color is on display. The wholesale dealer rush is gone by the time that we arrive. Only a few other people are in the shop. The wholesale dealer is more than willing to talk to us. And I need to talk because I’ve just discovered something that is most unexpected.
There are buckets all over the floor that are filled with Ranunculus. Ranunculus? There are Ranunculus flowers here that I’ve never seen before. The colors and patterns, and even some of the textures, are unfamiliar. I’m surprised because I’ve not seen Ranunculus in the bodega flower shops. From my sampling (albeit limited), there are no Ranunculus being sold in a typical bodega flower shop. Yet here, in this Flower District shop, there are lots and lots of Ranunculus.
The Ranunculus in the NYC Flower District show that you can also get unusual, often subtle, colors and color combinations. These are the kinds of flowers that attract floral designers. Bold colored Ranunculus would be in competition with other popular flowers, such as roses and carnations. Ranunculus in the NYC Flower District context fills, I believe, a different niche. Consider a floral designer creating centerpieces for a wedding reception or dinner. Do you want the floral centerpieces to attract all of the attention? Probably not. Instead, they should be beautiful but with muted colors. Perhaps color combinations that combine with other elements of the centerpiece. Most of the Ranunculus that Nancy and I are seeing at the Flower District seem to fit the “subtle� requirement well. And as such, many seem to be unsuited for the bodega market where a bouquet for an apartment needs to make a bolder statement.
Ranunculus fits the two roles well. This species can produce both bold and subtle flowers. Except in NYC, at this time of the year, it seems that Ranunculus is mostly used by the floral designer as a supporting player, not the star. The shops in the Flower District have lots of varieties of Ranunculus from which the floral designer can choose. Today, it appears that the floral designer, with their need for subtle and sophisticated flowers, is their customer for Ranunculus. The vendor in the store where we first saw the Ranunculus was quick to point out where the flowers were grown. “These are from Italy, these Japan, here are some from Israel, and these small ones are from New York,” he said as he walked among the plastic buckets pointing out the different varieties. It is true that there are a number of centers where breeders keep the variability of Ranunculus alive. They need not produce a lot of flowers of a particular variety. That’s the role of The Flower Fields and its huge outdoor display. The breeders who sell to the Flower District shops appear to select their plants for uniqueness.
Huge floral diversity was once a hallmark of Ranunculus. In the 1850s, England had nearly 900 named varieties growing in gardens. Ranunculus, for a few decades, was a floral star. Now, we know that the genetic variability remains in the species. Breeders can bring out the qualities hidden in the DNA in response to the markets that they serve. This is the story that came into sharper focus as a result of walking the NYC streets and focusing on the Flower District. The short visit to NYC doesn’t tell the whole story. I expect that things will change when The Flower Fields comes into full bloom (starting in March). Most likely, there will then be a large supply of boldcolored Ranunculus flowers shipped to the East Coast for distribution to flower shops, floral designers and bodegas. Will the arrival of bold-colored Ranunculus from Southern California crowd out the unusual varieties that we saw in this trip?
A Brief Backstory I’ve been looking at Ranunculus for many years. I’ve taken hundreds, perhaps thousands, of photos of the flowers of this species. The original reason for my focus on Ranunculus is the proximity of The Flower Fields to where my parents lived. It is a very popular tourist destination. It is fun to go there and take pictures. There are only about a dozen colors of flowers in the fields. Virtually all of the blossoms are bold and monochromatic. The plants that produce these boldcolored flowers are sold as bulbs.
The plants growing at The Flower Fields are arranged as a pattern. Broad stripes of different colors run horizontally across the hillside slope of the field.
In spite of the apparent homogeneity of the color bands, there are occasional flowers that are different. It wasn’t long before I learned where the “unusual� flowers could be found. Increasingly, I took photos of these flowers that had interesting variations in the color patterns and shapes.
Ranunculus is usually grown from bulbs. This allows propagation of interesting flowers as genetic clones. This was the basis of an immense amount of breeding in the 1840s and 1850s. You can see the amount of Ranunculus variability in the number of named varieties listed in the bulb catalogs of the time. There are 671 unique names of Ranunculus varieties in these three catalogues.
Unique Variety Names
400 350 300 250 200 150 100 50 0 1846
1849
1853
The relatively few Ranunculus varieties sold in today’s bulb catalogs implies that we have lost most of the variability of this species. A careful examination of the growing plants at The Flower Fields shows that the variability persists. It isn’t this variability that draws in the crowds to see the flowers. For the casual visitor, the focus is on the bright bands of bold colors. The visit to the Flower District in NYC reinforces an understanding that immense floral variability is retained in Ranunculus. Moreover, there is a continuing demand for flower breeders to select for interesting colors, patterns, and shapes.
Acknowledgements Nancy Furumoto is my partner and fellow sleuth on this and all my other expeditions. I can’t do this stuff alone. The sales people in the NYC Flower District shops were most gracious and were very helpful. We needed to look inside these wholesale stores. Thanks for letting us in. The complete story would not be possible without the help of Fred Clark and the wonderful people at The Flower Fields. A particular “thank you” goes to Jess Williams, the grower for Mellano & Company. Jess makes sure that The Flower Fields is filled with Ranunculus.
Resources The Flower Fields at Carlsbad Ranch http://www.theflowerfields.com This website provides a wealth of information about the history and current conditions at The Flower Fields. Check out this website if you are planning a visit. The Jungles of West 28th Street http://www.scoutingny.com/the-jungles-of-west-28th-street-exploring-newyorks-flower-district/ A well-illustrated 2011 view of the Flower District written by Nick Carr, a NYC movie location scout. The Future of the Flower District is Up in the Air http://newyorkyimby.com/2015/11/the-future-of-the-flower-district-is-up-in-theair-as-new-developments-grow-on-west-28th-street.html A 2015, in-depth discussion by Vitali Ogorodnikov of the development of buildings in the Flower District and the problems they present. War of the Roses http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/11/nyregion/war-of-the-roses.html A good discussion, written in 2004 by Erika Kinetz, of the problems of the Flower District with comments on the social role of this institution. Dutch Flower Line http://www.dutchflowerline.com/ The website of one of the shops in the Flower District. This is where we first found our Ranunculus.