Every year at home, it was my father's job to plant the vegetable garden, invariably with more or less the same vegetables: leaf lettuce, radishes, carrots, cucumbers and, of course, tomatoes!

After each day's work, before coming home for supper, he would check on the shoots and weed if necessary. Mom, on the other hand, was more concerned with the horticultural side of things, mainly with annual flowers, including the traditional Marygold, the large, sunny yellow carnations.

In Quebec, the ornamental horticultural sector is divided into four specialties: greenhouse cultivation, nurseries, sod farms, and Christmas tree cultivation, a business with a strong presence in the region.

Here's a statistical portrait of ornamental horticultural production in the province, according to a survey (2021) by the Quebec government:

Number of companies: 1,261
Area under cultivation: 18,196 hectares
Cash receipts (greenhouse plants): $218 million
Cash receipts (nurseries): $81 million
Cash receipts (Christmas trees): $99 million
Cash receipts (sod farms): $34 million

Québec ranks 3rd in Canada for ornamental production, after Ontario and British Columbia.

Cash receipts from the sale of vegetables in Quebec totaled $638 million in 2019. Vegetables were grown on 2,625 farms, including fresh, processed and greenhouse vegetables, as well as mushrooms.

The quantity of field-grown vegetables produced was 699,301 tonnes, and the quantity of greenhouse-grown vegetables was 40,995 tonnes.  In terms of area planted to field-grown vegetables, Quebec ranked second among Canadian provinces in 2020, with 36% of area, behind Ontario, which accounted for almost half (Source: agrireseau.net).

So, as part of its home survey, EnBeauce.com is asking the following question this week: Which do you prefer: flower garden or vegetable garden? Click here to answer.