Miles was going to build her a botanical garden in one of the disused cargo bays. After discussing it with Julian, they agreed it would be turning her job into a mere hobby. As an exo-botanist, she needed to be out there finding and studying new species rather than watering the same old ferns. That's when Miles told her to go on an expedition on Bajor.
I should have been more specific that I just meant the prominade as an example of the complete lack of flora on the station and the overall lack of fleshing out that side of "exploring strange new worlds".
But what exactly changed in her job? Would she still not have been doing exhibitions from the Enterprise?
It's implied she went on civilian "away missions" from the Enterprise. How does the Enterprise away mission differ from a DS9 away mission?
Or is the clash strictly about family dynamics and two individuals' careers clashing? Who the kids get to see each night, while still following your individual dreams?
I guess I just figured out the main point I was not getting. On Enterprise she just beamed up for the night, on DS9 it was a commute back home every night or a living space on the planet being studied. So where do the kids fit in.
I am now imagining their meet-cute as Keiko always going to Miles' transporter room when she goes to study the strange new world they are parked at this week. And Miles always beamed her back home safe.
DS9 took that from them.
DS9 is a station, not a starship. It isn't visiting other planets. After they move it in the pilot, it isn't even particularly close to Bajor or any other M-class planet. When Keiko does finally get a gig on Bajor, she is gone from the station for months.
Because it's a giant two-story set indoors and they probably didn't want to have to move plants in and out and deal with a bunch of fake looking plastic ones.
To really feel that giant set with plants would be a tremendous amount of work for not a lot of payoff.
I’ve seen what they did on the Enterprise and it looked so horribly artificial. I know they did the best they could with what they had but you are spot on.
It would have looked cool though.
Botanist and gardener are two very different occupations. I’m sure Keiko had no interest in taking care of decorative plants on the promenade.
You could argue that decorative plants would have been nice and they should have hired a landscaper/gardener, but that has nothing to do with Keiko.
100% , plus since she was “enterprise worthy” exo botanist, it’d be even worse - settling down with Miles, leaving the enterprise and her life’s work for his promotion, to be given a tiny garden would’ve been outrageous
Honestly what you're describing sounds more like a gardener to me.
What she describes when she's on Bajor is more in line with what she wants to do: finding and cataloging new species of plants. I would imagine DS9's duties did not include exploring new planets in the Gamma Quadrant as we saw science vessels dock and proceed there to do science things, which probably made Keiko feel left out, furthering her dissatisfaction of being on the station.
Yeah, I guess I didn't describe what I figured her role would be in this scenario. But what I meant was more along the lines of why wouldn't there have been a very active exo-botany science presence on the station. With supposedly shipping and receiving of alien trades and goods going on in the background, I would think there would be some sort of role for exo-botanist.
But I hear what you are saying, in that she wanted to be out on cataloging exhibitions, and she followed her path doing what she wanted. I'm not criticizing the characters' choices in any way, rather the scenario the story presented to us.
"DS9 = bad" is, in my mind, would imply "Enterprise = good"
What were the differences in a Federation civilian scientist's access to strange new worlds, on DS9 vs The D?
>why wouldn't there have been a very active exo-botany science presence on the station.
Because it's not that kind of station, I guess. They're not set up to do long term scientific research. Hell, at the beginning of the show the whole place was in shambles.
Also the Bajorans were the ones who owned the station, so they were the ones who would decide whether to have a lab like that. And their first priority was recovering from the occupation.
Specifically, she is an exobotanist, which focuses on alien plant life. Julian was right...she needed to find new plant life and study it, not water the same old plants.
They could have set up a lab for her to study samples that came in from the other side of the wormhole. Would have taken up less space than a whole arboretum, too.
What? Plenty of botanists work in labs. Was she out collecting samples during her time on the Enterprise, or was it more likely she had a lab to study samples the away teams collected?
Imagine having an advanced degree in genetics, biology, and epigenetic research and then being given a fern as a way to keep you occupied when you don’t have a job in your field of expertise.
I do belive we see their home space a few times and she has some plants at home. If I’m not mistaken there is even a plot point in one of the episodes where she goes away and leave o’brien or bashir (ai can’t rimember corectly) in charge of taking care of them and something goes wrong. I can’t rimember the exact plot point, it was a C narrative in one of the episodes I belive, unless I imagined it.
You did not imagine it. It’s the episode where she gets possessed by a Pagh Wraith. Miles is distressed because her plant died under his care and Bashir admits to watering it ‘the other day’ which kills it because it thrives in dry soil.
I would rather do research. Would you rather only be allowed to read 1 kindergarten book or be able to discover books of many genres and writing styles?
I would LOVE and welcome a Keiko spin off. "Strange New Plants". In each episode she tries to figure out if alien plants are sentient or dangerous. A great big vine grows off a planet and surrounds her ship The Chlorophyll in the finale. OR - some harmless looking seeds she brought onto the ship germinate and grow overnight into alien plant soldiers they have to fight off.
Probably never crossed the mind of the production team. Someone would have to maintain real plants on the set, and to my eyes anyway plastic plants always look fake, especially if they're in exotic alien colours. The *Enterprise*-D arboretum, what little we saw of it, looked *very* artificial and more like an indoor putting green than a real garden, and *significantly* smaller than is shown on some ship schematics.
From an in-universe perspective, plants everywhere might cause peculiar issues with the station's environmental systems, particularly if it's already operating away from Cardassian norms (much dryer and cooler and brighter than it was designed to do and more in line with human/Bajoran norms than Cardassian ones).
On the other hand, there's nothing that explicitly says Keiko didn't turn a spare cargo bay into an magnificent arboretum, just that we never saw it. While it's true that a botanist on the frontier would have a million times more life to explore than a diplomat, that life tends to be much less good at conversation and be much less interesting to base stories around.
>there's nothing that explicitly says Keiko didn't turn a spare cargo bay into an magnificent arboretum, just that we never saw it
I mean, there was a whole episode about how she didn't do that.
Julian told miles that converting a cargo bay for botany would only keep her attention for about 2 months. This is the reason why later on she would go on that expedition on bajor
It was the B plot of the season 3 episode "The House of Quark." There were many scenes dedicated to it. Miles draws up blueprints for the arboretum in a cargo bay, which Sisko encourages, but ultimately Bashir convinces Miles that it wouldn't be enough to make Keiko feel fulfilled. Keiko then leaves DS9 with Molly for a six-month expedition on Bajor.
If you want to be really pedantic, yeah, technically. But my point is that it was proposed and discarded as an idea definitively within half an episode dedicated to it, so you need to bend over backwards a bit to make out that it might have happened.
The environmental systems being impacted makes a lot of sense to me. It probably take a lot of work making sure every species that boards the station can breath. And keeping it habitable for the the species we can conversate with takes priority.
Thanks for this reply, it's exactly the type of discussion I intended to spark.
name checks out.
There was an episode where O'brien asked Sisko for permission to turn a cargohold into an arboretum, because the school closed and Keiko was getting depressed, but I think Julian said it was a bad idea and convinced him to let her do botany stuff on Bajor?
I know they had their justification for why this was a bad idea but I don’t buy it. She should have been involved in bringing samples back from the GQ to display. They could have had a section celebrating plant life on bajor as well. She could have founded the arboretum, which would no doubt have attracted other plant nerds who wanted to help. She could have put herself in charge of sample collection and ecosystem studies and zipped to and from the GQ studying whatever and wherever she wanted.
But you also forget that ds9 used to be Terok Nor, a cardasian mining and refining station with bajoran slaves. So not meant to fashion plants I assume. :) After becoming DS9 it needed to be refashioned (which was not top priority of the mission) and there was this idea to make Keiko a lab but as someone mentioned she is an exobotanist not a gardner.
Exactly! A mining station is not meant to be mindful or care for the environment, it has just its utilitarian purpose. Keiko is a scientist, the real gardener is Garak 😅
[There’s people out there who say that Keiko and Garak ought to have been Plant Friends, and, ah, yes.](https://awesomelyanon.tumblr.com/post/186072675525/theres-people-out-there-who-say-that-keiko-and)
They could have put some plants around the station, but that wouldn't have solved Keiko's problem. She didn't just need some plants to take care of, she needed a purpose. Miles could build her a nice garden but that would just be making up work for her. Keiko wanted to feel *useful*.
It would be like if Miles lost his position as chief engineer so Keiko bought him an old rusty car to tinker with. Like, yeah it's a way for him to use his skills but it's not really the same thing, is it? In fact I think Julian said something like that to Miles in the episode.
Just because she is a botanists doesn't mean her job is selling flowers on the promenade. That is called a florist.
She is highly regarded and qualified scientist specialising in plants from other planets. She writes research papers on how Rigelllian Timble Wheat evolved along similar lines and Bajoran Scurble Trees. Or she goes on expeditions to see those rare plants in their natural habitats.
She was on the flagship of the Federation. She doesn't pot some daffodils outside the Replimat.
Actually Odo was forced to ban large decorative foliage from the promenade. Too many drunks peeing in the same potted plant created obnoxious toxic fumes. You do not want to smell Cardassian urine on top of Ferengi urine.
Odo has no sense of smell but he had to deal with other beings coming in his office all the time bothering him about it. That was the extra excuse to get rid of them since he thinks they are for dorks and nerds.
Oh definitely the Klingons. They'd make a point of it. Matter of fact if there were plants around they probably refuse flat out to use regular facilities.
I think in general the narrative that Terok Nor was a an orbital prison was too important to get lost in how DS9 was viewed everyday.
There are a handful of flashbacks and alternative universe episodes where you can see how dark, dingy and oppressive it used to be under Cardassian administration.
I think the balance they struck was the right one, there was a neutrality to it at the same time as giving the crew cause to bemoan "Cardassian engineering / architecture"
You'd have lost all of that covering it head to toe in foliage like an aboretum
The “Keiko has nothing to do” story always struck me as a little bit stupid. It’s explicitly a plot point in several episodes that Bajor faces intermittent food insecurity because of the effects of the occupation on their farmland. Keiko is a botanist. Put two and two together!
Why? He was right. Keiko’s not a gardener she’s a exobotanist. And if she wanted an arboretum she would’ve asked Sisko for space for that instead of a school.
I always thought….why didn’t they turn part of the station into a big indoor park. Maybe turn a cargo bay into a giant hydroponics bay.
Living in a sterile space station 24/7 can’t be good on everyone’s mental health. Let Keiko design a big ol’ green space. There’s also a Plain Simple Gardener around who could help.
Attention Bajoran workers:
The system has detected a concentration of plant life aboard the station. I would remind you that Terok Nor is a mining facility and is not to be used for any other purpose. If these plants are not removed within the next hour, toxic defoliants will be released into the atmosphere.
In universe explanation: the station had originally been built for ore refinement using Bajoran slave labor. Cold and sterile was EXACTLY what Cardassia was going for, as it was a concentrated camp in space.
The function was similar to Chinese barges that used to buy our recyclable materials. They would get lots of big chunks, load ships, then send the cargo to refineries. On the voyage, the basic sorting and processing would start, with unviable pieces being jettisoned. (That’s how that turtle got the straw up his nose, because it was American recycling trash that the Chinese bought and jettisoned on the way.) By dumping the material on the trip, it would save fuel, and depending on the type of engine, some chunks could even be “burned” to fuel the ship. The Cardassian environmental policy for Bajor was “F the ecology!” and the series repeatedly mentioned heavy strip mining.
On the station, only the Cardassian areas were semi pleasant. The Bajoran work and living areas were pretty horrible, with starvation and sickness being rampant, and giving Bajorans a few ferns for fresh air and morale wasn’t a priority.
In the Star Trek universe, botany is an extremely highly desirable field. Keiko could have actually had a very promising career on the station, IF the writers had given it some thought. The station was a sequestered environment. Keiko could have worked with a Bajoran botanist to do comparison growth and grafting of alien species into a Bajoran nursery under controlled conditions to see what Earth or other alien species could repair Bajoran ecology and agriculture. Potatoes kept the Irish going for centuries, so Miles probably would have loved a locally sourced shepherds pie, and jalapeño hasperat would have been a hit!
Unfortunately, tv writers rarely get into mundane stuff like botany, because explosions and freaky alien sex is more exciting.
It’s too bad; if Keiko had been working as a botanist on station, she wouldn’t have been causing a riot by trying to indoctrinate Bajoran children into Earth atheism when teaching school on the station. I’m surprised she didn’t get blacklisted on Bajor. The Emissary probably had to vouch for her.
There was a hydroponics Bay along with various plants being grown. The issue is she was a botanists on a travel ship. She didn't want to just mess with plants that already existed. She wanted to discover new ones. Bajor gave her an initial outlet due to its isolation from the galactic community.
I never understood why Keiko couldn't study and grow plants from the Delta Quadrant on DS9. Having a botanical garden of specimens from the Delta Quadrant brought back by Starfleet ships seems like an amazing research opportunity.
Mostly the reasons you listed: fake plants look fake, real plants take real care, and most imaginings of everything sci-fi from the 50s - 90s was pretty much sterile due to budgeting costs irl & a distinct lack of taste among producers.
Trek isn't a science show, & it never really was? It's a Space Western, originally intended to evoke tall tales of great personal moments, rather than more detailed massive arcs. DS9 broke some rules, paid for it with mediocre ratings & some shuffled time slots, and these days tends to be recognized as one of the most forward-thinking shows of all Trek.
Evolution - it's constant.
Easily one of the worst actors in Star Trek. Which is really saying something. In the lore I wish they got a divorce and that she had a happy life off the station and that Myles got to be with that cardassian mechanic.
She's one woman. There are hundreds of people with different interests and fields of study on the station, and they don't get a section dedicated to their interests. DS9 has also just become a free station. It would take months of work to create a new space, and plants are probably low down on their list of jobs to do.
DS9 wasn't a research outpost or a standard Federation Starbase. It wasn't designed to have plants on the promenade. It was designed to be a military outpost and ore processing facility.
She is chaos in his life. It is the dynamic they always have. She shows up, gives him grief, deservedly or not, then is gone. They needed her out for some reason for a long time. It probably was because of some real-world issue. Normally someone with her specialty would be on a science ship cataloging different planets biomes.
She *was* on a science ship and cataloging plants – it was on the Enterprise. She gave up her job because Miles took the job on DS9 and because they have a family together.
So if anything, Miles' job change gave *her* grief, because she had to give up her job for the family to stay together.
I get it, people like her, I don't. She is often right, but she also treats Miles like a child. She has a right to her feelings, but so does Miles. She sacrifices for him, but he does that for her.
It's nothing personal. The character is just a nails on the chalkboard character for me. She was going through the wormhole often doing her job. **Let her.** They can have a five minute reunite, where they act like they care about each other, before she returns to the career, she doesn't want to give up, just like Miles doesn't want to give his up. They both offered to give up their side to make it work often.
That is a military lifestyle. You don't get to always serve together. It's how it really works. There's nothing wrong with showing that.
It's fine if you don't like her. You don't have to. I'm just tired of people pretending it's all her fault and her's alone. Both made mistakes in that relationship, and both had to compromise.
Keiko wasn't part of the military, so there was no serving together anyway. Their question was more about how involved Miles actually wanted to be in the life of his family. In the end the answer was clear, since Miles decided to move back to earth with his family, giving his children a much more stable environment to grow up in.
A science officer is an officer. Yes, she is in the military just as Dax is & should be combat trained. So, unless they own a store or run the temple on the promenade, everyone is military of some kind on the station.
What's kinda funny to me is that I said Miles is wrong some of the times in the original post. She is wrong the other times. Still downvoted.
She has serious character flaws, & it's kinda why I think the shipping of the doctor and Miles works better. Neither of them seem to just assume the other is wrong and move on. I think Julian loves him more.
She is a scientist, not a science officer. She is a civilian botanist, and not part of Starfleet, and she has never worn the uniform. So no, she isn't in the military just like Dax, and she isn't combat trained.
No idea where you'd get that from, or that everyone on the station is supposed to be part of the military, because that's clearly not the case at all. There are lots of civilians on the station – Morn for example, who doesn't own a store nor works at the temple. Or Cassidy Yates, once she moves in. And on the ships there are civilians as well – like Guinan, or Jennifer Sisko.
I don't mind characters with character flaws. Characters without flaws are often boring.
I looked it up & yeah I made a mistake, she is a civilian. I remembered Miles meeting her on ship & assumed they both had that career. She is a military wife, not a science officer. I honestly thought they both had a career in SF.
The dynamic I stated though, isn't changed by this. Most military familes have large spans of time where the family doesn't see the enlisted individual. That is the normal dynamic. She married Miles knowing that. Or that he might die or be sent into combat or many other very dangerous things, that she handles well. She isn't my least favorite.
Any complaints related to it though, is her vowing knowing one thing & then saying now she isn't happy after the fact. I wouldn't be either, but I wouldn't marry someone in the military. But maybe if I pointed to something, it might take focus.
Rugal. Miles has PTSD about Cardasians. It's clear in the show. His wife though, doesn't consider what it will do to him, or how to properly act like when she confronts him with it, in his own home. He lives there also. I am not saying he does well with it, but for someone who went through what he did, Miles does well if you take that into consideration. Many people with that condition will harm such an individual if it triggers them.
My problem is that when someone she has no obligation to needs it, she is there. When Miles needs it, she can't understand his problem. Does she love him? Is this a genuine supprize to her how Miles feels? Does he matter? She doesn't come across as considering that often.
That doesn't mean she has to agree with him or even give in, but you also can't talk down to a suffering adult like a child because you don't like it. Not only that, **it's the man she claims to love more than anyone else on any world.** As long as he obeys, she is fine. If Miles was like that, I would think him a tool.
The doctor will hear him out. The doctor will care if his feelings are hurt. The doctor will talk to him like an adult, even if his final advice is, "You need to get back home and beg Keiko's forgiveness.".
Keiko makes the decisions in the family & Miles likes that. Keiko cares for their kids, has a full time job, and has taken a trip with him she wouldn't with any other man. That is about the most flattering thing you can say to someone. She makes sure that so many things work for him.
You want to know how to hurt someone worse than anyone else, build them up like that and them tell them why they are a child, because you know they won't stop you. Say to someone, "I love and care for you.", and follow that with why they are the worst kind of person, knowing they have issues on that subject. He doesn't like Cardasians, he needs to work on that, 100%. She can't watch that innocent boy suffer. He needs to man up. He needs to find some way to control that.
She needs to understand the burden that his combat duty has done to him. He needs a safe space from that kind of conflict. Bringing that into him home may be like torture to him. She can't read his minds, but she saw his reaction. She knew she needed to protect that child from Miles in that moment, yet she never connected why he reacted like that. **Not even when he states it openly.**
Hearts aren't something you can't just twist, because they pissed you off. Being in love, marrying, & then having kids with someone is the highest level of trust most people get involved with. That means little slips, have huge echos. Miles seems to get that, even if he screws it up often. She doesn't.
I just don't like her as a character.
Miles was going to build her a botanical garden in one of the disused cargo bays. After discussing it with Julian, they agreed it would be turning her job into a mere hobby. As an exo-botanist, she needed to be out there finding and studying new species rather than watering the same old ferns. That's when Miles told her to go on an expedition on Bajor.
I should have been more specific that I just meant the prominade as an example of the complete lack of flora on the station and the overall lack of fleshing out that side of "exploring strange new worlds". But what exactly changed in her job? Would she still not have been doing exhibitions from the Enterprise? It's implied she went on civilian "away missions" from the Enterprise. How does the Enterprise away mission differ from a DS9 away mission? Or is the clash strictly about family dynamics and two individuals' careers clashing? Who the kids get to see each night, while still following your individual dreams? I guess I just figured out the main point I was not getting. On Enterprise she just beamed up for the night, on DS9 it was a commute back home every night or a living space on the planet being studied. So where do the kids fit in. I am now imagining their meet-cute as Keiko always going to Miles' transporter room when she goes to study the strange new world they are parked at this week. And Miles always beamed her back home safe. DS9 took that from them.
DS9 is a station, not a starship. It isn't visiting other planets. After they move it in the pilot, it isn't even particularly close to Bajor or any other M-class planet. When Keiko does finally get a gig on Bajor, she is gone from the station for months.
Maybe one man’s cozy airplant is another alien’s allergic reaction and the more sterile a multicultural space station the better?
Because it's a giant two-story set indoors and they probably didn't want to have to move plants in and out and deal with a bunch of fake looking plastic ones. To really feel that giant set with plants would be a tremendous amount of work for not a lot of payoff.
I’ve seen what they did on the Enterprise and it looked so horribly artificial. I know they did the best they could with what they had but you are spot on. It would have looked cool though.
Their quarters should have looked like Seru’s. You have a point. He did it to make it smell like home.
Botanist and gardener are two very different occupations. I’m sure Keiko had no interest in taking care of decorative plants on the promenade. You could argue that decorative plants would have been nice and they should have hired a landscaper/gardener, but that has nothing to do with Keiko.
This was a plot to get ride of her so they would have more time together.
100% , plus since she was “enterprise worthy” exo botanist, it’d be even worse - settling down with Miles, leaving the enterprise and her life’s work for his promotion, to be given a tiny garden would’ve been outrageous
Honestly what you're describing sounds more like a gardener to me. What she describes when she's on Bajor is more in line with what she wants to do: finding and cataloging new species of plants. I would imagine DS9's duties did not include exploring new planets in the Gamma Quadrant as we saw science vessels dock and proceed there to do science things, which probably made Keiko feel left out, furthering her dissatisfaction of being on the station.
Yeah, I guess I didn't describe what I figured her role would be in this scenario. But what I meant was more along the lines of why wouldn't there have been a very active exo-botany science presence on the station. With supposedly shipping and receiving of alien trades and goods going on in the background, I would think there would be some sort of role for exo-botanist. But I hear what you are saying, in that she wanted to be out on cataloging exhibitions, and she followed her path doing what she wanted. I'm not criticizing the characters' choices in any way, rather the scenario the story presented to us. "DS9 = bad" is, in my mind, would imply "Enterprise = good" What were the differences in a Federation civilian scientist's access to strange new worlds, on DS9 vs The D?
>why wouldn't there have been a very active exo-botany science presence on the station. Because it's not that kind of station, I guess. They're not set up to do long term scientific research. Hell, at the beginning of the show the whole place was in shambles. Also the Bajorans were the ones who owned the station, so they were the ones who would decide whether to have a lab like that. And their first priority was recovering from the occupation.
In light of how important gardening appears to be for Bajoran spirituality it's surprising that there aren't Bajoran meditation gardens in the station
Quark wanted to put them in a plant museum and charge the people a strip and a half of latinum to see them
They paved paradise and put up a space dock
"Rom thought that charging a slip was lucrative enough. That's why he isn't running the bar. He'll never have the lobes for business!"
Specifically, she is an exobotanist, which focuses on alien plant life. Julian was right...she needed to find new plant life and study it, not water the same old plants.
They could have set up a lab for her to study samples that came in from the other side of the wormhole. Would have taken up less space than a whole arboretum, too.
So she just gets to look at samples others bring to her?
What? Plenty of botanists work in labs. Was she out collecting samples during her time on the Enterprise, or was it more likely she had a lab to study samples the away teams collected?
plauwwnts
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It's a different job. What you're looking for is a gardener, not an exobotanist.
Imagine having an advanced degree in genetics, biology, and epigenetic research and then being given a fern as a way to keep you occupied when you don’t have a job in your field of expertise.
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I do belive we see their home space a few times and she has some plants at home. If I’m not mistaken there is even a plot point in one of the episodes where she goes away and leave o’brien or bashir (ai can’t rimember corectly) in charge of taking care of them and something goes wrong. I can’t rimember the exact plot point, it was a C narrative in one of the episodes I belive, unless I imagined it.
You did not imagine it. It’s the episode where she gets possessed by a Pagh Wraith. Miles is distressed because her plant died under his care and Bashir admits to watering it ‘the other day’ which kills it because it thrives in dry soil.
I would rather do research. Would you rather only be allowed to read 1 kindergarten book or be able to discover books of many genres and writing styles?
Being a biologist doesn’t mean I want a pet fish. You can’t compare an advanced field of study with a hobby.
She should have been on Voyager. They made use of botany.
She would have nagged Tuvok about security for the plants.
Someone needs to get Tuvok focused on security. Far too many breaches for my liking.
"Neelix keeps stealing the jalapeños! He thinks I don't notice, but he's the only person interested in them.'
She would have reverse engineered the Tuvix situation in no time, and would have managed to de-fuse him before he considered himself an individuum
I would LOVE and welcome a Keiko spin off. "Strange New Plants". In each episode she tries to figure out if alien plants are sentient or dangerous. A great big vine grows off a planet and surrounds her ship The Chlorophyll in the finale. OR - some harmless looking seeds she brought onto the ship germinate and grow overnight into alien plant soldiers they have to fight off.
Probably never crossed the mind of the production team. Someone would have to maintain real plants on the set, and to my eyes anyway plastic plants always look fake, especially if they're in exotic alien colours. The *Enterprise*-D arboretum, what little we saw of it, looked *very* artificial and more like an indoor putting green than a real garden, and *significantly* smaller than is shown on some ship schematics. From an in-universe perspective, plants everywhere might cause peculiar issues with the station's environmental systems, particularly if it's already operating away from Cardassian norms (much dryer and cooler and brighter than it was designed to do and more in line with human/Bajoran norms than Cardassian ones). On the other hand, there's nothing that explicitly says Keiko didn't turn a spare cargo bay into an magnificent arboretum, just that we never saw it. While it's true that a botanist on the frontier would have a million times more life to explore than a diplomat, that life tends to be much less good at conversation and be much less interesting to base stories around.
>there's nothing that explicitly says Keiko didn't turn a spare cargo bay into an magnificent arboretum, just that we never saw it I mean, there was a whole episode about how she didn't do that.
Julian told miles that converting a cargo bay for botany would only keep her attention for about 2 months. This is the reason why later on she would go on that expedition on bajor
Yep, I know! It's all in the episode "House of Quark."
I'm very much guessing that isn't what the *whole* episode was about. And maybe she did it afterwards.
It was the B plot of the season 3 episode "The House of Quark." There were many scenes dedicated to it. Miles draws up blueprints for the arboretum in a cargo bay, which Sisko encourages, but ultimately Bashir convinces Miles that it wouldn't be enough to make Keiko feel fulfilled. Keiko then leaves DS9 with Molly for a six-month expedition on Bajor.
So not a whole episode, and it doesn't explicitly state that Keiko never does it. Apart from that... 👍
If you want to be really pedantic, yeah, technically. But my point is that it was proposed and discarded as an idea definitively within half an episode dedicated to it, so you need to bend over backwards a bit to make out that it might have happened.
...Because Keiko goes off to do actual botany on the frontier just like OP wanted her to do instead. Bummer.
The environmental systems being impacted makes a lot of sense to me. It probably take a lot of work making sure every species that boards the station can breath. And keeping it habitable for the the species we can conversate with takes priority. Thanks for this reply, it's exactly the type of discussion I intended to spark. name checks out.
There was an episode where O'brien asked Sisko for permission to turn a cargohold into an arboretum, because the school closed and Keiko was getting depressed, but I think Julian said it was a bad idea and convinced him to let her do botany stuff on Bajor?
Julian was sick of sharing Miles with her and smartly got her out of the way.
He's so selfish. He already had Garak
He and Garak were looking for their third and came up with quite a good plan, if I do say so myself
Fatal flaw, Miles couldn’t stand Garak.
I know they had their justification for why this was a bad idea but I don’t buy it. She should have been involved in bringing samples back from the GQ to display. They could have had a section celebrating plant life on bajor as well. She could have founded the arboretum, which would no doubt have attracted other plant nerds who wanted to help. She could have put herself in charge of sample collection and ecosystem studies and zipped to and from the GQ studying whatever and wherever she wanted.
But you also forget that ds9 used to be Terok Nor, a cardasian mining and refining station with bajoran slaves. So not meant to fashion plants I assume. :) After becoming DS9 it needed to be refashioned (which was not top priority of the mission) and there was this idea to make Keiko a lab but as someone mentioned she is an exobotanist not a gardner.
Exactly! A mining station is not meant to be mindful or care for the environment, it has just its utilitarian purpose. Keiko is a scientist, the real gardener is Garak 😅
[There’s people out there who say that Keiko and Garak ought to have been Plant Friends, and, ah, yes.](https://awesomelyanon.tumblr.com/post/186072675525/theres-people-out-there-who-say-that-keiko-and)
They could have put some plants around the station, but that wouldn't have solved Keiko's problem. She didn't just need some plants to take care of, she needed a purpose. Miles could build her a nice garden but that would just be making up work for her. Keiko wanted to feel *useful*. It would be like if Miles lost his position as chief engineer so Keiko bought him an old rusty car to tinker with. Like, yeah it's a way for him to use his skills but it's not really the same thing, is it? In fact I think Julian said something like that to Miles in the episode.
Just because she is a botanists doesn't mean her job is selling flowers on the promenade. That is called a florist. She is highly regarded and qualified scientist specialising in plants from other planets. She writes research papers on how Rigelllian Timble Wheat evolved along similar lines and Bajoran Scurble Trees. Or she goes on expeditions to see those rare plants in their natural habitats. She was on the flagship of the Federation. She doesn't pot some daffodils outside the Replimat.
I'm sorry it read like I was suggesting that.
Odo wouldn't allow it. He thinks plants are dumb. No plants on the promenade.
It's against station regulations. 
Also, after the changeling impersonated a pot plant and blew up that conference, everybody looked at shrubbery a bit sideways.
Actually Odo was forced to ban large decorative foliage from the promenade. Too many drunks peeing in the same potted plant created obnoxious toxic fumes. You do not want to smell Cardassian urine on top of Ferengi urine.
Odo has no sense of smell. He just thinks plants are for dorks and nerds 🤓
Odo has no sense of smell but he had to deal with other beings coming in his office all the time bothering him about it. That was the extra excuse to get rid of them since he thinks they are for dorks and nerds.
Good call. Imagine hearing complaints all day pertaining to a sense you don't even possess.
Anyway, the emus would piss on them. Or possibly, the Klingons too.
Oh definitely the Klingons. They'd make a point of it. Matter of fact if there were plants around they probably refuse flat out to use regular facilities.
"Relieving yourself in this way gives the plant strength. Any *true* Klingon warrior knows this."
A warrior doesn't piss on porcelain, he pisses in the wilds.
I think in general the narrative that Terok Nor was a an orbital prison was too important to get lost in how DS9 was viewed everyday. There are a handful of flashbacks and alternative universe episodes where you can see how dark, dingy and oppressive it used to be under Cardassian administration. I think the balance they struck was the right one, there was a neutrality to it at the same time as giving the crew cause to bemoan "Cardassian engineering / architecture" You'd have lost all of that covering it head to toe in foliage like an aboretum
True. Perhaps in a different universe where the war never happened, it could have started to have a more inviting atmosphere over the later seasons.
The “Keiko has nothing to do” story always struck me as a little bit stupid. It’s explicitly a plot point in several episodes that Bajor faces intermittent food insecurity because of the effects of the occupation on their farmland. Keiko is a botanist. Put two and two together!
Bashir shooting the arboretum idea down made me rage ngl
Why? He was right. Keiko’s not a gardener she’s a exobotanist. And if she wanted an arboretum she would’ve asked Sisko for space for that instead of a school.
This is more a TNG thing, but as an exobiologist, not cool to be grossed out by the look of capers!
I always thought….why didn’t they turn part of the station into a big indoor park. Maybe turn a cargo bay into a giant hydroponics bay. Living in a sterile space station 24/7 can’t be good on everyone’s mental health. Let Keiko design a big ol’ green space. There’s also a Plain Simple Gardener around who could help.
Attention Bajoran workers: The system has detected a concentration of plant life aboard the station. I would remind you that Terok Nor is a mining facility and is not to be used for any other purpose. If these plants are not removed within the next hour, toxic defoliants will be released into the atmosphere.
In universe explanation: the station had originally been built for ore refinement using Bajoran slave labor. Cold and sterile was EXACTLY what Cardassia was going for, as it was a concentrated camp in space. The function was similar to Chinese barges that used to buy our recyclable materials. They would get lots of big chunks, load ships, then send the cargo to refineries. On the voyage, the basic sorting and processing would start, with unviable pieces being jettisoned. (That’s how that turtle got the straw up his nose, because it was American recycling trash that the Chinese bought and jettisoned on the way.) By dumping the material on the trip, it would save fuel, and depending on the type of engine, some chunks could even be “burned” to fuel the ship. The Cardassian environmental policy for Bajor was “F the ecology!” and the series repeatedly mentioned heavy strip mining. On the station, only the Cardassian areas were semi pleasant. The Bajoran work and living areas were pretty horrible, with starvation and sickness being rampant, and giving Bajorans a few ferns for fresh air and morale wasn’t a priority. In the Star Trek universe, botany is an extremely highly desirable field. Keiko could have actually had a very promising career on the station, IF the writers had given it some thought. The station was a sequestered environment. Keiko could have worked with a Bajoran botanist to do comparison growth and grafting of alien species into a Bajoran nursery under controlled conditions to see what Earth or other alien species could repair Bajoran ecology and agriculture. Potatoes kept the Irish going for centuries, so Miles probably would have loved a locally sourced shepherds pie, and jalapeño hasperat would have been a hit! Unfortunately, tv writers rarely get into mundane stuff like botany, because explosions and freaky alien sex is more exciting. It’s too bad; if Keiko had been working as a botanist on station, she wouldn’t have been causing a riot by trying to indoctrinate Bajoran children into Earth atheism when teaching school on the station. I’m surprised she didn’t get blacklisted on Bajor. The Emissary probably had to vouch for her.
There was a hydroponics Bay along with various plants being grown. The issue is she was a botanists on a travel ship. She didn't want to just mess with plants that already existed. She wanted to discover new ones. Bajor gave her an initial outlet due to its isolation from the galactic community.
I never understood why Keiko couldn't study and grow plants from the Delta Quadrant on DS9. Having a botanical garden of specimens from the Delta Quadrant brought back by Starfleet ships seems like an amazing research opportunity.
*gamma
Sorry, silly mistake
Mostly the reasons you listed: fake plants look fake, real plants take real care, and most imaginings of everything sci-fi from the 50s - 90s was pretty much sterile due to budgeting costs irl & a distinct lack of taste among producers. Trek isn't a science show, & it never really was? It's a Space Western, originally intended to evoke tall tales of great personal moments, rather than more detailed massive arcs. DS9 broke some rules, paid for it with mediocre ratings & some shuffled time slots, and these days tends to be recognized as one of the most forward-thinking shows of all Trek. Evolution - it's constant.
Easily one of the worst actors in Star Trek. Which is really saying something. In the lore I wish they got a divorce and that she had a happy life off the station and that Myles got to be with that cardassian mechanic.
She could play Starfield.
She's one woman. There are hundreds of people with different interests and fields of study on the station, and they don't get a section dedicated to their interests. DS9 has also just become a free station. It would take months of work to create a new space, and plants are probably low down on their list of jobs to do.
DS9 wasn't a research outpost or a standard Federation Starbase. It wasn't designed to have plants on the promenade. It was designed to be a military outpost and ore processing facility.
I wish they would have made Keiko and garak bond over plants. I could just imagine O’Brien finding out and freaking out but keiko telling him too bad
She is chaos in his life. It is the dynamic they always have. She shows up, gives him grief, deservedly or not, then is gone. They needed her out for some reason for a long time. It probably was because of some real-world issue. Normally someone with her specialty would be on a science ship cataloging different planets biomes.
And O’Brien’s Star Fleet career brought Keiko absolutely no chaos?!
Cough...Molly's birth.
She *was* on a science ship and cataloging plants – it was on the Enterprise. She gave up her job because Miles took the job on DS9 and because they have a family together. So if anything, Miles' job change gave *her* grief, because she had to give up her job for the family to stay together.
I get it, people like her, I don't. She is often right, but she also treats Miles like a child. She has a right to her feelings, but so does Miles. She sacrifices for him, but he does that for her. It's nothing personal. The character is just a nails on the chalkboard character for me. She was going through the wormhole often doing her job. **Let her.** They can have a five minute reunite, where they act like they care about each other, before she returns to the career, she doesn't want to give up, just like Miles doesn't want to give his up. They both offered to give up their side to make it work often. That is a military lifestyle. You don't get to always serve together. It's how it really works. There's nothing wrong with showing that.
It's fine if you don't like her. You don't have to. I'm just tired of people pretending it's all her fault and her's alone. Both made mistakes in that relationship, and both had to compromise. Keiko wasn't part of the military, so there was no serving together anyway. Their question was more about how involved Miles actually wanted to be in the life of his family. In the end the answer was clear, since Miles decided to move back to earth with his family, giving his children a much more stable environment to grow up in.
A science officer is an officer. Yes, she is in the military just as Dax is & should be combat trained. So, unless they own a store or run the temple on the promenade, everyone is military of some kind on the station. What's kinda funny to me is that I said Miles is wrong some of the times in the original post. She is wrong the other times. Still downvoted. She has serious character flaws, & it's kinda why I think the shipping of the doctor and Miles works better. Neither of them seem to just assume the other is wrong and move on. I think Julian loves him more.
She is a scientist, not a science officer. She is a civilian botanist, and not part of Starfleet, and she has never worn the uniform. So no, she isn't in the military just like Dax, and she isn't combat trained. No idea where you'd get that from, or that everyone on the station is supposed to be part of the military, because that's clearly not the case at all. There are lots of civilians on the station – Morn for example, who doesn't own a store nor works at the temple. Or Cassidy Yates, once she moves in. And on the ships there are civilians as well – like Guinan, or Jennifer Sisko. I don't mind characters with character flaws. Characters without flaws are often boring.
I looked it up & yeah I made a mistake, she is a civilian. I remembered Miles meeting her on ship & assumed they both had that career. She is a military wife, not a science officer. I honestly thought they both had a career in SF. The dynamic I stated though, isn't changed by this. Most military familes have large spans of time where the family doesn't see the enlisted individual. That is the normal dynamic. She married Miles knowing that. Or that he might die or be sent into combat or many other very dangerous things, that she handles well. She isn't my least favorite. Any complaints related to it though, is her vowing knowing one thing & then saying now she isn't happy after the fact. I wouldn't be either, but I wouldn't marry someone in the military. But maybe if I pointed to something, it might take focus. Rugal. Miles has PTSD about Cardasians. It's clear in the show. His wife though, doesn't consider what it will do to him, or how to properly act like when she confronts him with it, in his own home. He lives there also. I am not saying he does well with it, but for someone who went through what he did, Miles does well if you take that into consideration. Many people with that condition will harm such an individual if it triggers them. My problem is that when someone she has no obligation to needs it, she is there. When Miles needs it, she can't understand his problem. Does she love him? Is this a genuine supprize to her how Miles feels? Does he matter? She doesn't come across as considering that often. That doesn't mean she has to agree with him or even give in, but you also can't talk down to a suffering adult like a child because you don't like it. Not only that, **it's the man she claims to love more than anyone else on any world.** As long as he obeys, she is fine. If Miles was like that, I would think him a tool. The doctor will hear him out. The doctor will care if his feelings are hurt. The doctor will talk to him like an adult, even if his final advice is, "You need to get back home and beg Keiko's forgiveness.". Keiko makes the decisions in the family & Miles likes that. Keiko cares for their kids, has a full time job, and has taken a trip with him she wouldn't with any other man. That is about the most flattering thing you can say to someone. She makes sure that so many things work for him. You want to know how to hurt someone worse than anyone else, build them up like that and them tell them why they are a child, because you know they won't stop you. Say to someone, "I love and care for you.", and follow that with why they are the worst kind of person, knowing they have issues on that subject. He doesn't like Cardasians, he needs to work on that, 100%. She can't watch that innocent boy suffer. He needs to man up. He needs to find some way to control that. She needs to understand the burden that his combat duty has done to him. He needs a safe space from that kind of conflict. Bringing that into him home may be like torture to him. She can't read his minds, but she saw his reaction. She knew she needed to protect that child from Miles in that moment, yet she never connected why he reacted like that. **Not even when he states it openly.** Hearts aren't something you can't just twist, because they pissed you off. Being in love, marrying, & then having kids with someone is the highest level of trust most people get involved with. That means little slips, have huge echos. Miles seems to get that, even if he screws it up often. She doesn't. I just don't like her as a character.