Why Not To Buy Plants Of The Cyclewalas / Road Hawkers !!!

       

The Nursery retail scene in Mumbai has evolved over the years of lately iv noticed a trend where most old time nurserymen in the city were either disgruntle or shutting shop i often found myself wondering why these amazingly knowledgable , some extremely talented people absolute legends of the field i cant stress this enough people who have been in the line for 50-70 years have just suddenly shut shop...
          I sat talking over a cup of tea to one of these guys and he exclaimed " the property rates are through the roof....the #BMC is only out there to harass us fineing us at the drop of a hat ...while doling out hawking licences to every tom dick and harry with a bihari surname and a political linq " yes i do think that was a bit over the top but last few months i decided to take a closer what i saw i was horrified !!!
         I suddenly have seen a spurt of these hawkers on pavements , cycles with carts/cycles , selling plants .Plants with huge hibiscus flowers ,deep red roses and tulsi....oh so many tulsi....and a few other basic varieties. So i met this hawker and struck up a conversation learnt quite a few things that completely surprised me here is what i learnt :-

1) The Water :- Im sure most of you know one of the essential things a plant needs for its well being is water . The Roadside nursery guys find it extremely difficult to get hold of clean water as they basically reside in slums and shanties around their display so what they do is use sewage water either from the drains , storm water drains or worse still shulabh shauchalayas !!! (public toilets) How can you spot this ...look at the top soil of the plants you are buying...its either going to be dark brown or a black .

2) The Traveling plants :- These guys are essentially traders they dont grow absolutely anything travel to other nurseries in packs of 4-5 buy plants and sell them on a premium ...bot they do not have space to store or keep these plants when they come into the city so most of them are kept very small spaces. Now the main issue here is the guys who roam around in the hot sun with carts full of plants...yes the flowers are big and showie yes its convenient to just call out and buy a plant off this guy but do they last ? answer is no they never last cause the plants undergo severe scorching in all this travel .....dust ,car smoke ,loss of water , etc etc these plants may look to have a flower but its going to fall of the very ext day !!! .

3) The chemicals :- These guys who sell these plants are uneducated and basically they know 1 thing that you will buy the plant only if it has a flower or a fruit on it.So they will basically spray absolutely anything to make the plants flower not realising the plants will have a severely reduced lifespan. The plant will be like one of those bodybuilders who are on steroids the moment you stop all sorts of problems ensue.

4) The Varieties :- There are billions of species of plants one more beautiful than the other the hawkers just sell a small fraction of the vast offerings of nature . They do not know their proper names or their proper upkeep or what biodiversity means (or for that mater how it spells).v seen indoor plants being sold as outdoor plants , a guava tree sold as a jamun its appalling .They get in all these random invasive plants that do not do any good for our environment basically anything that has a flower on it they will sell ( iv seen so many of these sell white oleander which is highly poisonous).

5) The Maintaince :- These guys will tell you anything to sell the plants . Everything will be easy to maintain and everything will be perennially flowering and everything will need basic khaad and mitti and all diseases will be cured by rogor or bavistin...these guys will say anything to make a sale.


Know better guys go down to your local nurseries most of these will have way better quality of plants they will have better varieties and better info on the plants you buy.