Greenhouse Management
Understanding
Environmental Impacts of
Horticulture
Student Learning Objectives
•Explain environment and issues
related to the environment.
•Explain how horticulture is
beneficial to the environment.
•Explain how horticulture can
damage the environment.
Student Learning Objectives
•Identify how natural resources
can be affected by horticultural
practices.
•Identify how chemicals used in
horticulture can affect the
environment.
What is the environment and what are
issues related to the environment?
• Horticulture and the environment are
intertwined. The environment is the
nonliving, or abiotic, aspect of an
organism’s immediate habitat.
• It includes physical and chemical features,
such as rocks, minerals, air, and water.
What is the environment and what are
issues related to the environment?
• Living things, including horticultural
plants, animals, and microorganisms, are
referred to as biotic.
• The study of living things in relation to
their environment is called ecology.
• An ecosystem is a community of
organisms and its nonliving environment.
What is the environment and what are
issues related to the environment?
• One cannot ignore the fact that
horticultural practices have an influence
on an ecosystem.
• Some practices disturb the ecosystem.
• However, proper horticultural practices
can limit the negative impact on the
ecosystem.
What is the environment and what are
issues related to the environment?
• Public demand for a high-quality product,
growers concerned over how to produce a
high-quality product at a low cost, and
the impaired health of the environment
have raised issues.
• Intensive land use involves using
production practices on large fields to get
top yields.
• These practices can greatly affect the
natural resources in an area by altering
the natural environment.
What is the environment and what are
issues related to the environment?
• The use of integrated pest management
is a biological control method used to
fight pests.
• Integrated pest management (IPM) limits
damage to the environment.
• IPM is a strategy that
uses a combination of
measures to reduce pest
damage with the least
disruption to the
environment.
What is the environment and what are
issues related to the environment?
• Biotechnology and genetic engineering
have been used to help produce new
plant varieties and improve others.
• Some people are concerned with the
environmental impact of these genetically
altered plants.
What is the environment and what are
issues related to the environment?
• Horticultural practices have introduced new plant
species.
• Some of these species have escaped cultivation
and have out-competed native species, disrupting
the ecological balance.
• Plants that have the ability to thrive and spread
aggressively outside their natural range are called
invasive plants.
tree-of-heaven
Purple loosestrife
multiflora rose
How is horticulture beneficial to the
environment?
• Horticulture is beneficial to the
environment in many ways. Its benefits
can be both personal and biological.
• Plants can be used for personal benefit in
recreational settings such as golf courses
and public parks.
How is horticulture beneficial to the
environment?
• Biological benefits of horticulture include
the use of plant parts to help prevent
erosion, slow water runoff, absorb
pollutants, control dust, and provide
wildlife habitat.
How is horticulture beneficial to the
environment?
• Landscaping can also help improve the
value of real estate by increasing the
beauty of an area.
How can horticulture damage the
environment?
• Many horticultural
practices require the
disruption of the earth
and the application of
chemicals.
• If not applied as
directed, these
chemicals can become
pollutants.
• Pollution is a hazard of
horticultural practices.
How can horticulture damage the
environment?
• These practices, and others, can cause harm
to the environment if not practiced carefully.
• Improper management and excessive or
improper use of chemicals or water supplies
are examples of ways horticulture can damage
the environment.
How can horticulture damage the
environment?
• Pollution occurs when harmful or
degrading materials get into the
environment.
• Point source pollution comes from
sources that are easily identified.
• An example would be severe soil erosion
from a landscape construction site.
• This type of pollution is easier to control
than nonpoint source pollution.
How can horticulture damage the
environment?
• Nonpoint source pollution can come
from few to many different sources and is
more difficult to control.
• Widespread use of chemical fertilizers and
pesticides on lawns in urban areas can lead
to pollution of waterways.
• This type of pollution cannot be traced to a
single place of origin.
How can natural resources be
affected by horticultural practices?
• Water resources, wetlands, and wildlife are
all natural resources that can be affected
by horticultural practices.
• These effects can be adverse or beneficial.
• Water resources are essential to the
environment, since all living things need
water.
• When water is used, nature has its way of
restoring it.
• The hydrologic cycle and infiltration are two
ways nature restores water.
How can natural resources be
affected by horticultural practices?
• The hydrologic cycle is the way water
flows through the environment from
sources such as oceans, lakes, rivers,
streams, groundwater, and reservoirs.
• Water moves through a series of
processes, including:
• Precipitation—water deposited on the
earth in the form of rain or snow
How can natural resources be
affected by horticultural practices?
• Evaporation—the changing of water from
a liquid to a vapor while passing through
the air
• Transpiration—the movement of water in
vapor form
• Condensation—the changing of water
from a vapor to a liquid
How can natural resources be
affected by horticultural practices?
THE
HYDROLOGIC
CYCLE
How can natural resources be
affected by horticultural practices?
• Infiltration is the movement of water
through the soil.
• Proper land management practices in
horticulture can affect both the quantity
and quality of water that will eventually
become groundwater.
How can natural resources be
affected by horticultural practices?
• Wetlands are an important part of the
hydrologic cycle.
• Wetlands include swamps, bogs, marshes,
mores, ponds, or other places where water
stands.
How can natural resources be
affected by horticultural practices?
• Wetlands are areas protected by law, and
plans are being made or are in place to
restore or enhance most wetlands.
• Wetlands are essential to the environment
as flood control, wildlife habitat, and
shoreline erosion control.
• It is important to maintain wetlands when
using horticultural practices.
How can natural resources be
affected by horticultural practices?
• Wetland ecosystems can also be used to
enhance an environment.
• They can be used for recreation, such as
fishing and hunting, or provide beauty and
comfort for people to enjoy.
How can natural resources be
affected by horticultural practices?
• Wildlife habitats can also be threatened by
horticultural practices.
• Wildlife can be defined as plants or
animals that are not domesticated.
• With planning, it is possible to create areas
for wildlife to live.
• Habitat is the place where wildlife lives in
nature.
• Habitats can be natural, such as forests or
wetlands, or human-made, such as golf
courses or parks.
How can natural resources be
affected by horticultural practices?
• To reduce chemical hazards to wildlife, it is
important to understand the habits of
wildlife.
• Applications should be made when they will
cause the least harm to wildlife.
• It is also important to
use the correct pesticide
formulations.
• Granular formulations
can be especially
dangerous to birds.
How can chemicals used in
horticulture affect the environment?
• Fertilizers and pesticides are the two main
horticultural chemicals that affect the
environment.
• When used as directed, harmful effects on
humans, plants, animals, and the
environment are limited.
• Used inappropriately, both can be
detrimental to living organisms.
How can chemicals used in
horticulture affect the environment?
• Fertilizers are used to achieve optimum
plant growth.
• Growers strive to provide plants with the
level of fertilizers needed for the best
growth.
• Excessive fertilizer use is both financially
wasteful and harmful to the environment.
How can chemicals used in
horticulture affect the environment?
• Eutrophication is an overabundance of
nutrients in a body of water; it is caused by
excessive fertilizer running off fields and
into ponds, rivers, and lakes.
• Eutrophication can be harmful to aquatic
life because it depletes the oxygen supply
in the water.
How can chemicals used in
horticulture affect the environment?
• Most fertilizers are high in nitrogen.
• When needed and used by plants, nitrogen
is not harmful to the environment.
• The nitrogen cycle is the circulation of
nitrogen throughout the environment.
• When excess nitrogen is introduced to the
nitrogen cycle and mixed with nitrates
found in the soil, the result could be an
increase in nitrates found in groundwater.
How can chemicals used in
horticulture affect the environment?
THE
NITROGEN
CYCLE
How can chemicals used in
horticulture affect the environment?
• Phosphorus loss through surface runoff is
also an environmental concern.
• Well-placed turfgrass and ground covers
can help reduce phosphorus leaching.
How can chemicals used in
horticulture affect the environment?
• Pesticides are chemicals used to kill plant
and animal pests.
• When used correctly, pesticides cause little
or no harm.
• Risk in using pesticides is associated with
residues.
• Pesticide residue has been proven to cause
problems such as water contamination,
emergence of resistant pest populations,
and decline in certain bird populations.
How can chemicals used in
horticulture affect the environment?
• To reduce the need for pesticides, it is
important to keep plants healthy.
• Healthy plants are able to defend
themselves against pests, and they are
able to tolerate low levels of pest
population.
How can chemicals used in
horticulture affect the environment?
• Pesticides enter the environment in many
ways.
• Some are vaporized, others leach through
the soil, and others travel in surface runoff.
• It is important to use pesticides as
specifically directed because they
decompose slowly in the environment.
Review/Summary
• What is horticulture and how does it
relate to science and technology?
•What are the three major segments of the
horticulture industry?
•How do the segments of the ornamental
horticulture industry differ?