GARDENING FOR WOMEN

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3020, 6 March 1917, Page 6

GARDENING FOR WOMEN

RESERVES' COMMITTEE APPROACHED. ! Miss Birch, of tho Y.W.0.A., was ! introduced to the Reserves Committee of the City Council yesterday afternoon by Councillor R. A. Wright, with the idea of ascertaining what prospects of encouragement tho council would offer young women as gardeners. Miss Birch stated that she had formed a class of women fur the purpose of studying gardening with the possibility of them taking up work professionally in order to release men for military service or other work, and she wished to know whether the City Council was prepared to offer any inducement to such young women in connection with the Botanical Gardens and other city reserves with garden plots. . The chairman (Mr. Geo. Frost) said that the idea was a new one as far as Wellington was concerned, and he thojight it would be'best for her to have a chat with Mr. Glen, the supeo intendent of reserves, about the work generally, and the duties that were required so that he. could report on the proposal to tie committee. Hβ also suggested that Miss Birch might consul b with Mr. La Trobe, director of the Teohnical School, on the matter of giving instruction in the right direction. As to whether it would be expedient for the council to employ women would be a policy question, which the council would have to decide. It is understood that Mr. Glen thinks very highly of women gardeners, and his experience of them in the United Kingdom was that they were as, a rule reliable and most enthusiastic in their work.