LEWISTON – Mark Eustis and Le-Ann Kropa can plant 1,000 flowers a day.

A little rain last Friday was not going to slow that pace.

Perched on a Main Street median just before noon, pushing aside pockets of dirt for petunias, Eustis was stoic about the cold, the conditions, the traffic – until an ambulance went by and he finally winced.

Those things can splash.

Three Public Works teams of two planted and mulched around the city Friday, part of a weeks-long annual process to pretty up dozens of corners, parks and medians. The really hard part was already over. The winter salt and sand, fast food wrappers, glass, cigarette butts and other trash had already been raked out.

While cleaning the beds, workers found “everything they can throw out of their car and then some,” Kropa said.

By the time they got to the loose, dark soil for planting, the petunias practically slid in. A few minutes, 55 seedlings and a dozen canna lilies later, this strip was done. On to Court House Plaza.

City Arborist Steve Murch said he likes to keep Main Street with a petunia and lily theme.

“They’re really, really drought tolerant,” he said, which means the flower can take a long weekend without water. Plus, “If they get stomped on by pedestrians or vandals, they’ll come back.”

He looks after 30 to 40 spots around Lewiston. In some, the crew picks a pattern or design. Sometimes, it’s a given, like marigolds in the star at Veterans Park, laid out in honor of Gold Star Mothers who’ve lost children in war.

Murch gets most calls from the public about the cannas, which burst into bright red flowers from August to October. (They’re actually dug up in the fall, split and replanted come spring.)

“What was originally $50, now we have between 500 and 1,000 of them,” Murch said.

Over in Auburn, median and sidewalk planting begins Tuesday, according to Parks Superintendent Leroy Walker. Parks and Rec shares planting and prep duty with Public Works in that city.

Walker goes for bright shots of color.

“I like to mix it up,” he said. “The same old thing sometimes gets dull.”

In front of the Androscoggin County Courthouse this summer, that means some daisies and impatiens, maybe some geraniums. He and Murch agreed that the flowers can be inviting for business, set a good tone.

“It beautifies and I think it really attracts a lot of people with good feelings,” Walker said.

Feelings Friday on the rainy median were chilly. Eustis, in his 10th summer with Public Works, wore a winter coat under a bright orange rain suit. Kropa, in her second summer, wore a turtleneck. After a while, water and dirt started to seep into their rubber-backed gloves.

“The No. 1 comment from passersby is, ‘Can you come over to my house?'” Eustis said.

Sometimes they’ll respond: Sure, cook us dinner. Then the light changes and the conversations stop.