Buying Garden Plants
FREE PLANTS
...One of the most enjoyable ways of acquiring plants to receive them as gifts from gardening friends. Many well established perennials need to be divided every few years to keep them growing and flowering vigorously. This is most often done in the spring or fall. If your friend, offers you a start from their prized iris or day lily bed, accept gratefully and listen attentively to all the advice on how to grow the plants.
Other plants that can easily started from such divisions include many house plants such as ivy or pothos, shrubs such as lilac and forsythia, and most types of groundcovers. You can also exchange seeds with friends such most gardeners will have extra.
Extend your gardening friends by checking out seed exchange sites on the internet.
Seed Exchanges
www.seedsaver.org
Canadian seed savers
Australian Garden Exchange
Plants for a Future (English Site)
Irish seed savers
Buying smartly
... Local garden clubs often raise funds by selling donated plants. These will often include many varieties that are not available in garden centers and would be much more expensive to order through mail. Garden club sales are a good way to find out what plants and varieties are grown in a local area. Garden club members are the best informed and most enthusiastic of gardeners.
E-bay and other auction sites have a surprising number of growing plants, usually perennials, listed for sale. As always, the buyer needs to exercise some caution in buying from unknown individuals and companies.
The most common way to buy garden plants is from garden centers and nursuries. Nurseries mostly grow their own plants in greenhouses while garden centers are usually large retailers who sell plants and garden items as a part of their seasonal line. Nurseries are a better place to get information from employees, but they usually charge more. Garden centers are cheaper but the busy sales clerks may know nothing about gardening.
When buying live plants, look for healthy growth with well formed leaves. For many flowers, the best size plants are about four inches tall with flower buds that have not yet opened. If you can, lift the plant a little out of the pot to see the roots. Plants that have completely filled their pots are called "root bound" plants. The roots start to grow around and around the pot and try to grow out of the bottom holes. This is less of a problem with annuals than with trees and shrubs, their roots can more easily be spread out during planting. It is best to avoid plants that are badly root bound. Also look for any sign of disease or insect infestation.
Garden centers do most of their business in the spring. After the Fourth of July, many of the remaining plants go on sale. Clearance plants can be great buys, but be sure they are healthy and will survive being planted during the hottest summer days. Extra watering can make mid summer planting possible. Plant just before a rain, if possible.
Ordering through catalogs or through websites is an old and well established way of obtaining perennials, shrubs, and even trees. The plants are often shipped at planting time in a dormant condition. Some are also shipped in small pots that are trimmed well back. Most mail order plants are usually two years old.
Seeds and bulbs of many varieties are also available through mail order:
Burpee Seeds
Chiltern Seeds (England)
Mr. Fothergill(Australia)
Verseys (Canada)
Seeds of India
New Zealand Seed
