One day in late December, no fewer than a dozen catalogs filled my mailbox. Since then, another eight have arrived.
I guess it’s time for me take a look. But before my annual catalog review, I thought it might be helpful to review the advantages and pitfalls of what was once referred to as “buying by mail.”
First things first though. Who are you buying from? No, really, who are you buying from?
There have been so many bankruptcies, buyouts and reorganizations in the horticulture business in the last 10 years that it’s a tangled web of who used to be whom, who’s related to whom and who now owns what.
For example, it’s been a long time since Jackson & Perkins was a respected rose grower. That business was bought out by Park Seed, which also bought that once premier catalog company Wayside Gardens, and last April all three went belly up. Park has survived and was purchased by a white knight but it’s unclear what the future has in store for the other two and who’s pulling the strings.
I recently read a piece about a business analyst who happens to be a gardener. She got really curious when she called Gurney’s Seed & Nursery to ask a question about planting asparagus. She wrote that she was asked to hold, then transferred to someone who answered from “Spring Hill Nursery.” She said she’d just been speaking with someone from Gurney’s and was transferred back. But the next person to take the call answered “Henry Fields.”
It gets even more complex when she did a little digging on her own to find that all three of these once venerable companies were all now linked to Scarlet Tanager, LLC. She went on to uncover an incredible tangle that included connections with Spring Hill Nursery, Breck’s, Gardens Alive and others. I’ve written about issues with several of these firms in the past and it seems they have the same genetic links. Buyer beware.
So, who do you trust and who do you buy from when you want quality plants, new introductions and a vendor that’s got great customer service and can be relied upon? In a nutshell, you have to do your homework.
The catalogs and offerings from a firm like White Flower Farm are always tempting. I can’t go through any of their catalogs without leaving a dozen or more sticky note reminders.
But if I bought three of everything that tickled my fancy I’d be spending hundreds of dollars each time. Not that bad, until you get the order or look at the sizes quoted in the catalog where it says “3-inch pot” or “bare root” and those three 3-inch pots and bare roots cost nearly $60 plus shipping.
I don’t know about your garden but if I put a 3-inch something in my garden it gets lost pretty quickly. Stuff like this has to go into a holding garden, be grown for a year or more, then replanted in the garden.
The alternative is to hope that the same item is available at your local garden center in a 1-gallon pot. They may still cost you $20 each, but they’re ready to plant and bloom.
Ah, but then there’s the “new factor.” White Flower Farm and the other better mail-order nurseries usually offer plants at least two years before local garden centers have them and in many cases they never show up locally or only years later. What’s a gardener to do?
Well here’s some advice. First, if you want to have the newest and you’ve got to be first or just can’t resist, you have to pay the price. There’s no way around it. First-year offerings of heucheras, echinaceas, hostas, or that new thread leaf maple are going to cost you. And you are not going to get it in a 1-gallon pot.
Second, know thy vendor. There are still great family nurseries and small nurseries that do business only via catalogs and the internet. These are the folks who are growing the rare and hard-to-find varieties that you won’t find in the big box stores or the second-rate catalogs.
When in doubt, simply Google the name of the nursery and you’ll get the good and bad news in seconds.
Third, throttle your expectations. The stuff that comes via the mail, UPS or FedEx will be small unless it’s a bulb or tuber, in which case you should know from the catalog exactly what size you’re getting.
If you’re ordering from the West Coast (lots of hardy lilies and peonies come from there), use shipping and track your order so you know to be home the day it arrives. While my UPS driver is a great guy and has been known to track me down when plants arrive, the FedEx guy (if he finds my house at all) won’t hesitate to drop the box in a nice bright, sunny, hot spot where it bakes. Not good at all.
Now there are some plants that don’t like being transplanted. No matter what the size, bulbs and roots like peonies and iris should be planted directly in the garden.
For small shrubs, trees and perennials (fast growers like chrysanthemums, sedums and others excepted), I put them in a holding garden. Most are potted into an appropriately sized nursery pot or fiber pot that’s usually a quart up to a gallon or larger, using a combination of potting soil and garden soil.
When in doubt, underpot, as overpotting will lead to constantly wet soil and rotting. The pot is then buried or sunk in the holding area at soil level where it stays for several months to a couple of years.
When it’s a suitable size, the pot is simply lifted out of the ground. And when possible, the plant simply popped out of the pot (the roots will hold the ball together), or if it’s pot-bound, the pot is cut with a utility knife.
For the patient gardener, this results in a large, high-quality plant without the premium price, or a high-priced small plant that’s now much larger and won’t get lost in the garden.
For those of you looking to cut costs even further, wait until prime gardening season when the garden centers are packed with plants. Look for plants like astilbes, ornamental grasses, hostas and other plants that completely fill the pots and seem to be full and lush.
Buy one or two and bring them home. Keep them well watered and out of direct sunlight. And on a cloudy or misty day, pull the plants out of the pots, divide them in half (or more) and plant the divisions.
If you’ve chosen your plants wisely, they will recover and fill out quickly. And you’ll cut your plant costs by half or more.
Think spring. Start doing your catalog work. Order early. Tune in next week. And of course, keep growing.
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