Spring is Just Around the Corner!
The winter sowing for the nursery is complete, with some warm season seeds still to go. All together I’ve sown, or will be sowing, just over 300 species for 2025, although some of them won’t be germinating for another year or so. I expect to be able to offer a little over 200 species this season.
Between now and spring I’m working on getting this website updated and ready for spring sales. This includes improving the search and filter tools for the plant profiles and adding a section about how I’ve designed my current nursery business model, with low inputs and low overhead, to maximize sustainability, have low barrier of entry and pay a living wage.
I’ve also added pages about restoration plantings, including a list of species growing from locally gathered seeds, and a page on community and school plantings.
The nursery will re-open for orders, for local pickup in Ottawa and Perth, in early May 2025 and will continue with bi-weekly inventory updates through the summer and into the autumn.
If you are working on planning a native plant garden, you might find a presentation I prepared that includes step-by-step instructions for planning a complex native plant community helpful. You can watch the recording here
I expect to offer some form of course or regular workshop starting in mid-summer 2025 but I’ll wait until I’ve finished a course on designing depth education activities that I’m taking in April before deciding on the exact format and content. I can say that I’ll be drawing on ideas and resources developed by the Gesturing Toward Decolonial Futures Collective for whatever form the actual activities take.
If you are interested in participating in land care activities, please let me know via my Contact page and I’ll add you to the email list I'll be using to announce gatherings. You don’t need to commit to any particular dates of number of gatherings to be on the email list.
On the design front, I’m very happy that so many people are working on converting spaces to native plantings and I’m also happy to help with the planning process and learning curve.
To maintain a healthy level of commitments and responsibilities, I’m limiting my design availability to the times of year that the seedlings and the gardens don’t require as much of my time and attention. I’ll make site visits each year in the fall and will complete the plans over the winter. I’ve added some example pricing info to the design page and can add your name to the fall 2025 design list if you think that what I offer is a good fit for what you need.