Horticulture is the science and art of producing fruits, vegetables, flowers, and ornamental nursery crops, and the management of horticultural enterprises. Students gain practical experience by working in our fields, greenhouses, and orchards, or through internships. Horticulturists combine scientific knowledge and technical skills to grow and develop plants for better human nutrition, and to improve the aesthetic quality of our environment. They conduct research, develop technology, and assist public and private organizations involved in landscape plant production, sale, and use.
Enterprises involved in production, marketing, and services offer many career opportunities.
Production positions include owning and managing greenhouses, nurseries, or fruit and vegetable growing enterprises. Marketing positions include wholesaling, distributing, and retailing horticultural crops and products. Service positions include careers in teaching, research, cooperative extension, and less traditional positions such as zoo horticulture and horticulture therapy. Horticulture graduates are also needed as field supervisors, sales representatives, and directors and technical advisers in industries and grower cooperatives that process foods, produce seeds, and manufacture and distribute agricultural chemicals. Other possible positions include landscape contractors, horticulture writers, quality-control personnel with food processors, and inspectors for various state and federal regulatory agencies.