I'm frustrated about something and thought I'd vent here a bit, so excuse
me....

Where I live there seem to be 3 types of places where I can buy plants:

--Places like Lowes, Home Depot, Walmart, etc. that have "garden centers"
but that isn't the main thing they focus on.
--Mid-size to large commercial nurseries that specialize in plants.
--Small "mom-and-pop" type places.

Of those 3, I'd really prefer to patronize the last two figuring that I'll
get better plants.

BUT, at least in our area the last 2 places are very bad about labelling
their plants well. Meaning, they give you the general name of the plant,
but not the particular name or variety. Generally, places like Lowes, etc.
actually have tags on their plant that give all the information one could
desire, so why can't the local nurseries? I understand that they often
raise the plants themselves, but I'd think that would make it more important
for their own sake to track these things better.

Example, earlier today I was looking for a Passion Vine. There are many
different varieties of this plant. One large local nursery had quite a
selection in their greenhouse. This nursery is the premier nursery in this
area with several locations and friendly, helpful stuff. They had at least
5 different varieties of what I was looking for. All of them labelled "Red
Passion Vine." Never mind that several of them had different leaf shapes
and other differences were obvious. They were all grouped together as if
they were the same. A very nice staff lady tried to describe the blooms,
but that's not very helpful and it doesn't account for how obviously
different plants would have the same bloom.

Another local nursery, owned by two very nice people that have sold me many
very nice plants, had a similar selection of diverse plants all bearing tags
that simply had their color--no other information.

I WANT to buy from the local nurseries, but I also want to know exactly what
I'm buying. I wish I had the experience to look at a plant and immediately
know what variety it is, but I don't--especially if the plant isn't in
bloom. I wish nurseries in my area would do a better job with this.

Tony