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With its bright and vivid leaves, the Poinsettia or Christmas Star, has become a firm favorite in many countries. The velvety red plant has now become redolent of Christmas as much as Santa Claus or the robin's red breast. And in Britain they're big business. The U.K. market is worth 25 million British pounds every year.

Poinsettias were used by the Aztecs as long ago as the 14th century for dye and medicine. The popularization of the plant began nearly two hundred years ago when Joel Roberts Poinsett, the first United States Minister to Mexico in 1828, brought a Poinsettia home with him. In Mexico, they call it the Flore Nochebuena or the Christmas Eve flower.

At the Roundstone Nurseries in Chichester, West Sussex, 150 thousand poinsettias are being grown to supply the Christmas demand.

Sharon Frame has been working at the nursery for more than 10 years and has witnessed first hand the Poinsettia's growing popularity in the UK.

"It's just a Christmas plant that people like to purchase for Christmas. It's a good decorative plant to have at home. And it's just because I think the color people just like it. They can either dress a fireplace, have it on a windowsill, a table decoration or for a Christmas present."

The nursery is one of the biggest in the UK. More than 40 acres of glass is spread out over the Sussex countryside. Inside more than 180 million plants are grown a year. At this time of year the nursery is brimming with Poinsettias. With modern machinery it takes just a handful of staff to manage such a vast operation.

Poinsettias are known as short daylight plants. They flower when there's less than 12 hours daylight, when the leaves turn red to attract pollinating insects. The modern Poinsettia is the result of cross breeding.

All one hundred and fifty thousand of the plants are watered daily by hand. The water has to be kept off the leaves otherwise they become marked and also attract fungal infections. The Poinsettias, like many plants, are susceptible to white fly which damages the foliage. But they use no insecticides, just a system of biological control. The plant is so popular at Christmas and that is a huge relief to the staff at the nursery. This is a time of year when they wouldn't normally have much else to grow. Frame says,

"It's a very important crop because from July onwards our busiest time of year is the spring for bedding plants. But growing the Poinsettias keeps everybody fully employed up until Christmas and into the Christmas period."

And jobs are in short supply in a modern glasshouse. Especially when you consider the entire nursery is now controlled by a single PC. For the people who work here, Poinsettias really are a Christmas present in more ways than one.

For China drive, I'm Huang Rui.

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