In Rare Form
Metro-area boutique nurseries offer out-of-the-ordinary alternatives for your garden
Garden centers are great for loading up on standard-bearer annuals and perennials, and grabbing a pair of garden gloves or maybe a colorful concrete gnome on your way out the door. Boutique or specialty nurseries don’t have accessories, gnomes, or even gardening tools and fertilizers. What they do have is plants—interesting, unusual, hard-to-find, and fabulous plants grown by people who started out as rose or dahlia or hosta enthusiasts and got carried away. You, too, can be an aficionado. Here are just eight of the Twin Cities discerning boutique nurseries to visit this season.
Hostas
Tucked into a quiet residential neighborhood in Edina is a 2.5-acre nursery that sells hostas—more than 1,600 varieties. Owned and run by Arlene Savory and son Dennis, Savory’s Gardens is a family business that was started back in 1946. The jam-packed display gardens mix well-known varieties—‘Gold Edger’, ‘Sum and Substance’—with Savory-hybridized ‘Golden Jubilee’, a $125 mini-hosta with rippled, all-gold leaves and lavender blooms.
Savory’s Gardens, 5300 Whiting Ave., Edina, 952-941-8755, savorysgardens.com
Martagon Lilies
Bob “Doc” Gilman grows martagon lilies—he’s not exactly sure how many, and availability is always shifting, though he does ship to customers as far away as Germany. What he might do—provided you call first, preferably in late June or early July—is show you around his lush backyard and then take you out to the 2-acre Hartle farm down the road, where dense clusters of martagons are planted among old oaks and hostas. Point out the ones you love, and Doc Gilman might just sell you a bulb or two, some of the most unusual in the Midwest. A sure-bet for beginners is ‘Claude Shride’, a prizewinner with red-lacquered tapels.
Hartle-Gilman Gardens, 4708 E. Rose St., Owatonna, 507-451-2170, geocities.com/hglil
Culinary Herbs
Why settle for basil when you can have sweet and spicy ‘Ararat’ basil with hints of anise, or bright and lemony ‘Mrs. Burns’ basil, or ‘Napoletano’ basil with leaves so huge you can sub it for lettuce in BLTs? Since 1977, Jim and Theresa Mieseler have been expanding herb horizons at their Chaska farm, where eight greenhouses produce 13 varieties of sage, six varieties of mint, and more. For the best selection, shop in May, and bring a picnic lunch so that you can dine in the sunshine and wonderfully fragranced air.
Shady Acres Herb Farm, 7815 Highway 212, Chaska, 952-466-3391, shadyacres.com
Hardy Roses
Sam Kedem has heard it a thousand times: “I just can’t grow roses.” That sad refrain prompted him to start his cold-climate rose nursery back in 1989 to prove that rose growing is often more about the variety than gardening skills. “The big garden centers, even now, like to stock warm-climate roses in the summer, which just frustrate people,” he says. At Kedem’s nursery, Minnesota rose-growers will find 225 varieties of roses hardy to Zones 2 through 5, including a huge selection of Griffith Buck roses, hybridized at Iowa State University. If you covet a specific variety, such as the double apricot-blush ‘Dakota Song’, one of Kadem’s own introductions, call ahead to reserve. Otherwise, just swing by for a tour of the display gardens and Kedem’s gentle reassurance that roses are absolutely within your reach.
Town & Country Roses, 12414 191st St. E., Hastings, 651-437-7516, kedemroses.com
Tropicals
It doesn’t make one iota’s worth of difference to Ricardo Edelstein what “Zone” he’s in—when winter comes, he just bundles up his banana trees and potted palms, hauls them inside, and lets the Cuban jazz band in his heart play on. Edelstein caters to other like-minded gardeners with his huge selection of tropicals, which includes cascading bougainvillea, pinwheel-shaped plumerias, gardenias, jacarandas, 14 hues of hibiscus, and 50 varieties of palms. Whether you buy tropicals to enjoy as annuals, or keep them in a sunny inside corner all winter, Edelstein has a hot cup of Caribbean coffee and a tropical suggestion for you.
Tropical Plants & Topiaries Unlimited, 16155 Forest Blvd., Hugo, 651-488-7717, tropicalplantsunlimited.com
Minnesota Natives
Gardeners looking to lighten their load on the environment and celebrate Minnesota’s native flowers and grasses will find kindred spirits at Landscape Alternatives in Shafer. Co-owners Karl Ruser and Roy Robison sell real native container plants, all grown on their 60-acre farm from seed they collect in the seven-county metro area. You’ll find more than 230 varieties of ready-to-plant flowers and grasses, everything from wild indigo to partridge pea to dwarf-crested iris, and two very passionate tour guides.
Landscape Alternatives, 25316 St. Croix Trail, Shafer, 651-257-4460, landscapealternatives.com
Dahlias
At the far end of a gravel road in Long Lake is a glorious scene: bed after bed of dinner-plate sized dahlias, more than 150 varieties of them. This is the playground of Lisa Ringer, who quickly and cheerfully admits that she grows the “poodle of the flower world,” a Mexican native flower that requires special braces for its top-heavy stems and little umbrellas to shade the blooms. Ringer offers both dahlia tubers and pre-started dahlias in gallon pots, as well as a specialty compost tea. Visit in mid-summer for the showiest tour and more than 30 varieties of fresh-picked heirloom tomatoes.
Two Pony Gardens, 1700 Deer Hill Rd., Long Lake, 763-473-0783
Rare and Wonderful
Even in her 70s, plant-enthusiast and garden designer Betty Ann Addison will not slow down, and she’s definitely not retiring. When her long-time nursery in Blaine folded due to an invasive highway project, she simply packed up her rare alpine plants and dwarf conifers and headed to her home in Fridley to start anew. Her smaller-scale operation doesn’t have the same “wow” factor Rice Creek Gardens once had, with its six-step waterfalls and overflowing beds, but if you’re hunting for a native ladyslipper, an unusual primrose or violet variety, or just something to turn the neighbors’ heads, Betty Ann will not disappoint.
Gardens of Rice Creek, 1315 66th Ave. NE, Fridley, 763-242-5009, gardensofricecreek.com
Alyssa Ford is associate editor of Midwest Home.
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