Xref: kermit rec.gardens:262843

I had to landscape an entire yard for our new house last year. I saved
money by growing a lot of stuff from seed. Also check out local fundraising
plant sales and swaps in your area, your local hortacultural assn. probably
has a list. Apart from the mail order places that other people have
mentioned, I had good luck with Gilbert H. Wild, www.gilberthwild.com They
have great deals on large numbers of plants, like their 50 hostas for 50
dollars, 100 hosta for 100 dollars. They don't have every plant known to
mankind but they concentrate on daylillies, hostas, oriental lillies, iris
and peonys for good prices. Those kind of perennials are the tough,
rewarding kind that will form the backbone of a garden in almost any zone.

mm

"Jim Lewis" wrote in message
...

"PBarnes149" wrote in message
...
Has anyone out there purchased from them? I have my first
house and yard to
plant this year so I am curious about the different mail order
catalogs I get.
Thanks in advance for your help. Pat

It helps to know where you are from (we don't need an address,
just a general area;-). Someone may be able to recommend
something from your neighborhood.

Generally speaking you will almost always be better off buying
from a NURSERY in your area. By "nursery" I do NOT mean, Lowes,
Home Depot, Wal-Mart, K-Mart and others of that ilk. They're
fine for annuals, etc., and topsoil, gravel, pavers, etc. but I'd
avoid them for landscape plants. You never know how far the
plants they carry have traveled before they reach the X-mart lot.
Nor do you know the USDA climate zone their little genes have
acclimatized themselves to.

Local nurseries are more likely to buy their plants from
suppliers in the same USDA zone (or within a zone or two either
way). This means the plants should survive in your area. A GOOD
local nursery will also offer a guarantee -- and a *really* good
nursery will honor the guarantee even if it was your idiocy that
caused the plant to die. :-) Local nurseries also are more
likely to carry plants that are NATIVE to your area. Some may
even specialize in natives. And, for the same money (especially
when shipping is factored in) you will ALWAYS get a larger plant
locally.

All that said, I have bought and been happy with plants from
Wayside Gardens, White Flower Farm, and Parks (which, I think,
owns Wayside). All are quite a ways north of me, but their
plants did OK here -- perhaps taking a year or two longer to
adjust than a local nursery's might have done.

We are very lucky in having several excellent -- and large --
nurseries in our town, including one that specializes in North
Florida native plants, so I mostly just drool over the pictures
in the catalogs, then see what I can find locally. Most of our
local nurseries get their plants from a huge wholesaler who grows
on 1,000 acres a few miles north of me across the line in the
state of Georgia. So I KNOW these plants are ready!

Jim Lewis - - Tallahassee, FL - Only where
people have learned to appreciate and cherish the landscape and
its living cover will they treat it with the care and respect it
should have - Paul Bigelow Sears.