Commercial Floriculture

Grading and its methods followed for important flowers

• Grading refers to categorization of flowers on the basis of their quality.
  
• Each bunch should be of same size, weight and quality before marketing them.
  
• Mostly grading is done on the basis of appearance, harvesting maturity, blemishes or injuries due to disease, attack of insects or pests, colour and size of the bud, straightness, strength and length of the stem.
• The flowers should look fresh, harvested at right maturity, free from pests and diseases;
  
• Stem should be straight, free from side shoots and should be strong enough to hold the flower erect.
  
• The foliage should be free from physiological disorders such as bent neck (in roses), tip bending (in gladiolus) stem break (in gerbera) and calyx splitting (in carnation) etc.
  
• There are no uniform common standards for flowers in the world; many countries have developed their own grading systems based upon the market requirements.