I'm going thru my Thimpson and Morgan book NOW.

I've already placed most of my seed orders - although the majority of the seeds are annuals and vegetables this year. I've also got a list of dahlias I need to narrow down and order.

Not doing much perennial buying this year... yet, lol. At least that's what I'm telling myself *now*. Give it a few weeks and a few more catalogs in the mail...

:)
Dee

I've ordered a pile of seeds (T&M, Pinetree, plus some from trades), and more daylilies than I really need (Marietta Gardens), and a small handful of perennials (Bluestone - variegated liriope, hosta 'Fragrant Bouquet,' and a helleborus, plus a lilac). NO MORE ORDERS. Really, it's time to stop ordering, and time to start winter sowing the seeds. But oh, that Select Seeds catalog has some GOOOOOOD stuff in it. . . .

Laurel

I'm planning on keeping a list (with pics and info) of all the plants I see in catalogs that entice me. My plan is to keep it with me as I cruise garden centers and try to find whatever I can locally. I love mail order for the convenience and selection, but I did a ton of it last year and got turned off by mostly small sizes for the big bucks compared to local finds.

at least thats the plan!! still early in the catalog season ...

Wendy - I like your idea! I have a running list of things that I think will go well with what is already in the flower beds, but putting a picture with it will help save time when I'm trying to decide what to order.

Last year when I was planning the garden at our new home, I tried to find things locally, but we live in a small town, and there just isn't the selection that can be found online. I will look again this spring, but chances are I will have to mail order the things I want.

How fast do the online places sell out?

A friend of mine and I placed an order for a variety of hardy Opuntias...wanted to make sure they were available even though they don't ship out until summer.

Oh, I definitely agree about trying to find stuff locally. I can find most of the stuff I'm looking for in my neck of the woods if I know where to look, I am privy to some great nurseries.

I did order those few things, though, because I looked for Betony last year and couldn't find any (one place carries it but it blew out the door in the spring), and I got burned on Illustris elephant ears last year. I was so MAD! I paid top $$ for a pot of them, but after a couple weeks they got some funky disease or virus or something and looked lik cr@p the rest of the season. I don't know what it was, but I personally think the bulbs were virused because none of my other elephant ears came down with it, only the pot of Illustris I bought. In years past I had ordered Illustris from Select Seeds with no problem, so didn't want to take a chance this year with diseased stock. I've never seen Black Stem in my area, so thought I'd try that too.

I ended up not ordering the Salvia, I don't really have anywhere to put it, and I decided not to grow it in pottery.

Only been ordering plants for a couple of years online, so it's still amazing to me how my choices have expanded ex-
ponentially. . .when I get a new catalog now, I skim it
immediately (as if ignoring it were an option!), but then I immediately check out their on-line catalogue, and I'm
always astonished at the number of items that are available for Web-Only purchase. . .but that's what we all thrive on - MORE CHOICES!

Laurelin: I noticed you were ordering daylilies from
Marietta Gardens (Ever been there? Be sure to rob Ft. Knox before you go!). . .also noticed you are Zone 5a/4b, so I
thought I'd share something I've discovered: of my many
daylilies, those that thrive best are the ones I bought grown in a zone close to my own. My two favorite
growers in the Northeast, both Zone 5 and lower, are:

www.ollaliedaylilyfarm.com
www.bloomingfieldsfarm.com

Carl

I don't usually place plant orders online, as we have several local suppliers that offer a wide range of plants, at fairly cheap prices. But there isn't one here that offers many native plants, and those that do, plate them in gold, or so their prices indicate! and that forces me to the keyboard. I have been trying to place an order for several hours, but the vendors shopping cart has a problem and I can't complete the entire process without losing the order and wind up with a message stating "your shopping cart is empty". If I could find the plants elsewhere, thats where I would go. A very frustrating experience! I finally figured out that it is a timing error and the cart is being emptied before I could complete the shipping and billing details.
Guess an email or phone call is the only answer.
Rb

Gosh, I haven't made one order yet. For some reason, I keep going around in circles about what I want and where I want to get it. Part of the problem is this weather. I did Winter Sowing last year but this year has been so warm.

I can find native plants at NEWFS which I do enjoy adding as many as possible to the yard. Perennials are about $7. for a good size quart. That is a pretty good price for what you are getting. Very healthy.

Plus there is a local plant sale that I have found some great bargains at in past years, so I could do that.

The last time I bought plants through the mail, I was not happy with them and sent back a number of them. So, more than likely any orders I make will be for seed.

Still looking though.

:-)
pm2

I received four plant gift certificates for Christmas, and I spent the two Bluestone ones yesterday. Whee! There's nothing like paying about $2.98 for a box full of plants (besides the GCs, I had the free shipping from returning packaging materials, the 20% off for early order and 3-4 coupons).

The other two are for local nurseries, so they're safely tucked away until May. I don't have luck starting seeds indoors, and we have a short growing season, so I need to buy plants rather than seed packets.

I'm so glad that last year I took photos of the beds about every three weeks. They're really helping me to figure out what I need -- otherwise I'm sure I'd be all over the place buying what attracts me with no regard to whether I have room for it. I pick up plants the way magpies pick up bright shiny objects, which is not good for my budget!

I buy more plants online than locally, simply because I can't find them locally, or if they are available they're $15-20 for a half gallon pot, or half dead at wally-world. Or I can drive an hour and a half, fight traffic and run from place to place looking for them. For me it's a no- brainer - order from the catalog or online. I've found which places I'm happy with and will continue to patronize them.

Wow! $15-$20 for half gallon perennials? Things must be bad in other parts of America. I think plants are expensive when they're $5.95! We have plenty of choices here in Utah at that price. Maybe we're just too cheap to let the nurseries get away with higher prices!

hostaholic2: It sounds like your situation is very similar to mine. There are a couple of very small local nurseries, which don't carry a big selection, there's Walmart, or a 20 minute drive to Lowe's, or over an hour to Grand Junction, which is the largest town on this side of the mountains. If you have to drive that far, you might as well pay the shipping and save yourself the aggravation!

We moved here last spring, but didn't get started on the landscaping until August, so I am not sure how soon I need to place my order for the online companies. You can't plant anything here until after Mother's day, but I'm afraid if I wait the things I want will be sold out. It is hard to know how much to order, since the ground is still frozen, and I don't know how much of what I planted in the fall is going to come back.

Maybe I'll order the couple of things that I didn't get last year now, and then place a second order later for anything that has to be replaced. Who knows, if I get to know the owners of the small local nurseries, maybe they can order what I need, and I would at least save on shipping costs.

Thanks for the suggestions, Carl! I've looked at the Bloomingfields website, and I could spend quite a bit of $$$ there too. I got a Marietta gift cert for Christmas, but I'm sure that won't be my last/only daylily order for the year. I'll have to check out the Olallie site, too.

I got some really nice plants from Betty's Country Gardens last year; she's in a colder zone, and her plants were quite healthy and robust. She was VERY nice to deal with, too. I'll attach the link below, but I don't think she has her 2007 listing up yet.

Laurel

Here is a link that might be useful: Betty's Country Gardens (daylilies)

I just placed an order yesterday for $2500 (wholesale) worth of hellebores........does that count?? LOL!! Seriously, I order and buy perennials for a retail nursery so my ordering is nearly constant beginning about now and continuing into the fall. And I have to admit it is very satisfying to be able to order whatever piques my interest with OP's money, just as long as I stay within my budget. It just happens to be quite a bit larger than most individual gardener's :-)

While I do understand the need for a great many of you to order online or from catalogs (otherwise the selection is just too limited or uninspired), I would encourage you to support your local independent nursery (NOT Home Depot or Wal-Mart) whenever possible. The competition is tough, the costs associated with running a retail nursery high and the returns extremely dependent on weather and the vagaries of the customer base. Too many independents are falling away to attrition - rising real estate costs, taxes, transportation costs - and it's a frightening trend. Without your support, the Wal-Marts and HD's of the world will take over and all that will be left is extremely generic choices of ill-tended plants (often unsuitable for that climate) and no customer service or those able to answer culture and care or even design questions. Please, support your local independent retail nursery whenever possible!

I'll be ordering mostly seeds. I have some wonderful local places to get great plants.

Side note to Stevation above- if you haven't been to Willard Bay Gardens- get there. It's the best plant nursery in the State.

We have totally torn apart our yard and are in the process of re-landscaping. We'll have about 1/2 as much lawn as we used to so I'll be needed A LOT of plants. I wish I had a $2,500 budget to buy perennials! Since I don't, I'll be growning my 'backbone' perennials from seed.

Thanks for the PSA Gardengal - I sometimes feel like I'm all alone on my "support your local independent nursery" soapbox and everyone's throwing rocks at me...nice to hear the voice of someone else who shares my sentiments. :)

Oh, I'm with you too on "support local independents" - please don't feel alone in your mission! It's just that I live in a part of the country where they're relatively few and far between.

I don't shop big-box stores for plants, and you couldn't pay me to set foot into a Wal-Mart for any reason. So, each spring, I drive at least 150 miles round-trip, each and every plant shopping day, to hit the independents that are "local" to me. I take days off, I spend the mornings driving and the afternoons planting what I found. It's a pain, and I think I almost spend more in gas than I do in plants.

I do prefer, when I can, to see the actual plant I'm purchasing... and to transport it home myself rather than have it stuffed into a cardboard box and mailed to me. If I had enough in-person options available to me, I wouldn't do mail order except for the most rare and special items.

Don't worry, I think I spent enough at the local nursery last year to keep them in business for a while. This year I did order a bunch of roses from different places, and used two $25 gift certificates to Bluestone for plants that I couldn't find last year. I plan on spending a bunch of money at the local nursery again this year as they have great bareroot trees and I have just enough room for one or maybe two more. And maybe a few roses if they get in some good ones again this year. I'm still hoping to order a few daylilies as the nursery here doesn't get many of the nicer ones and you have to know by the name what it is going to look like because they never have pictures. I did manage to find a couple worth trying when they were on sale though.

I rarely buy at local box stores mostly because they do not carry anything I would be able to use in my shady garden. But there is also slight problem with local nurseries- those that I want to buy from are waaay out of my pocket range.
So one of my major sources is growing plants from seeds whenever possible. I have indoor light stands and have been doing winter sowing method for while so by now I do not need anything, do not have space in the garden either. What I want is a different matter entirely. I have literally hundreds of seedlings indoor now and more pots placed outside. I do have several nurseries where I usually go every so often and end up buying something or other.
I do try to give my business to them as much as I can. OTOH- woodland, shade loving rare plants are not common to many nurseries so...

I do try to support the local independent nurseries in my area, but they are few and far between, so if I want anything unique I have no choice but to order. I will not buy from the big box stores, even if it wasn't on principle, I don't want their generic, unmarked or mis marked plants.

hostaholic2, sounds like we live in the same neighborhood! :)

I guess I'm not descriminating enough ... I tend to spread my small gardening budget all around. I ordered seeds online yesterday, and picked up a few seed packets at Walmart (yes I shop there, the only other grocery in a twenty mile radius is fine for produce and meat, but too expensive for all of my shopping needs), and I will visit the local nurseries in the spring for things I couldn't order from seed.

This is what I've ordered so far:
Agastache rupestris
Asclepia tuberosa 'Gay Butterflies'
Verbascum 'Southern Charm'
A couple of varieties of sweet peppers, a variety of herbs, and some annuals - I love the Cosmos 'Bright Lights' and the dwarf version 'Ladybird'. Also the Hypoestes Phyllostachya - red. Then there's the strawberry and African Daisy seeds I picked up at the ... you know where : )

I still want some Heuchera's and Blue Oat Grass, but I'm not even sure where I'm going to put everything, assuming the seeds germinate, AND I don't kill the seedlings. The main thing I still need is more attractive containers. I don't care for plain clay pots, and many of them will be on my front porch where they can be seen from the street, but I haven't found a reasonably price source. Any suggestions?

I haven't ordered anything but seeds yet, but I may order a couple of things (I'm thinking of attempting a pear espalier) and then probably mostly buy locally. The Forest Farm catalog always has a few temptations. About the box stores. I had a discouraging moment last spring. In addition to my home garden, I have a plot at a community garden that is very close to a box store. One day I was over there and wanted a couple of things for a planter. I was on my bicycle, so I pedaled over to the box store because it was so convenient. I didn't find anything I thought worth buying, but the place was mobbed, and not-so-great-looking plants were flying out the door. I decided spend an extra 100 calories or whatever and pedal to a small, independent place I like that wasn't far away. Comparitively empty of people. Much nicer annuals and veggies, many of which they propogated themselves. And I don't think the prices were all that different. It just made me a little disheartened that so many people were buying mass over class.

lindalana--I don't know where il IL you live, but do you ever shop the nurseries in or very near the city proper? True, if you're getting things like skunk cabbage seeds sent from Canada, you're not going to find the selection exactly amazing, but occasionally you find some nice surprises--so many people have narrow, urban gardens where sun is at a premium, the shade-plant selection isn't always half bad.

I live north suburbs so my shopping trips mostly contained to that area. My favorite one is Chalet but it is so pricey that I can only go there in August- Sept- Oct when plants go on sale. Once they hit sale benches I can always find few things I dreamed about.
I have close ties to Lurvey's and find them pretty good providing their choices are limited to certain things.
Pesche is another one worth visiting.
I am at the point where paying $10-12 for a gallon size .... well it must be very special plant... otherwise I think to myself...have to look it up and see if I can grow it from seed... much more interesting that way...

There are a few really good local nurseries that I check each year. My favorite is not in any danger of languishing from lack of my attention and funds! I only order what I'm not likely to find there, if it's something really special. And I order seeds, for winter sowing. And daylilies. I'm actually ordering very little this year, compared to other years, since I'm running out of garden space, I have a much better idea of what I really want/need, and I'm getting better at winter sowing. And, realistically, my budget is smaller this year than in past years. So I have to make more from less (which is why winter sowing is so great for me). Trading and going to plant swaps is also great fun and a good way to get new plants.

Laurel

I had a disappointing gardening season last year because voles and chipmunks destroyed roots on many of my favorite plants and clematis and the weather was so variable. Also, several plants ordered from Bluestone gave up the ghost shortly after planting, plus I went overboard by ordering too many daylilies and by wintersowing. So I am overcompensating this year by not ordering or wintersowing anything. I will shop locally. I want to add more shrubs to borders this year. The weather and critters are wearing me out--too many gardening disappointments! Perhaps once spring arrives I will feel differently....
Marcia

Lindalana--we're probably not all that far from each other. Never been to Pesche's (I always hear it's nice) or Lurvey's (both a little west of where I usually roam for plants), but I agree the Chalet is at its best when you can catch a sale. It's nice that they sell a few ephemerals, and nicer still that they sell them for a buck or two once they've gone dormant.

Marsha, I don't think I did all that great with some of my Bluestone things either (admittedly bought cheap, subsequently soemthwat ignored). I'm crossing my fingers the clematis squeak through the winter despite late planting.