On the Road Blog - Nurseries To Visit While Traveling
10/12/2023 2:57 pm
Nurseries worth visiting when you travel.
Let's face it, we are not just gardeners, we are also travelers who love plants. So when we travel, we visit gardens and nurseries.
Below are some favorite out-of-the-area nurseries. If you have one that is a favorite, please send us a note about it and we'll add it to the list. Contact Us.
Note that Nursery names in Blue are links to websites. We also maintain a vast nursery list for NC/SC/TN and distant GA locations accessible under Members Only "Plant Nursery Guide to Atlanta & Beyond".
Pennsylvania
Lancaster County
Lancaster County is known for high quality nurseries with great prices. Predominantly but not exclusively Amish farms, the scenery is wonderfully bucolic. A couple of favorite nurseries there are listed below. There are many more small nurseries dotted throughout the area, so don't hesitate to explore.
Black Creek Greenhouses - 211 E. Black Creek Rd, East Earl, PA 17519
Amish run, this nursery features endless plants inside a series of connected greenhouses which form two giant sections. The leftmost section are perennials (1,000 of varieties) hardy to Zone 6 and a few shrubs. The right hand side is annuals, vegetables, succulents and dwarf conifers. You will find plants hardy in Georgia on the right hand side, so don't skip it. Prices are incredible as is quality. There's also a great supply of items for fairy gardens, pots, asparagus starts, bulbs and on and on. It is a one of a kind place. You won't find lots of info on signs, mostly just plants, plants and more plants. And other stuff. Nice restrooms too! Paved parking lot. They do not have a website.
On your way out of Black Creek, you may see a series of small signs "Perennials" "Cacti" and "Succulents". If you like clever potting arrangements and cacti or succulents, follow these signs to an Amish farm with goats near the driveway and a single greenhouse up the hill. Amazing bargains on cacti and succulent await you! There's no nursery name and probably no posted address. You just need to stay straight after you follow the first signs and then see three little ones again. (Sort of reminds me of France, following "chevre" signs to private homes.)
Conestoga Nursery, 312 Reading Rd, East Earl, PA 17519. Just down the road from Black Creek is one of the nicest shrub and tree nurseries around. They have excellent prices for unparalleled quality, and great selections too. They carry a handful of well grown perennials but aren't silly enough to compete with Black Creek and vice-versa. They do not have a website.
Groff Plant Farm, 6128 Street Rd Kirkwood PA 17536
Groff's is considered a Mecca of well-priced and super healthy perennials and shrubs. I can always count on finding Salvia 'Wendy's Wishes" here and they tend to have the most current horticultural darlings. Larger hardy plants are kept outside, divided in two large areas by sun and shade. Plant signage is excellent.
There are also about 8 accessible greenhouses for vegetables, annuals, young perennials (great if you are traveling by plane and a bargain too), houseplants and succulents. Larger annuals are off to the left of the entrance. Friendly dogs and the cleanest ever porty-potty are on site. The parking lot is gravel and the site is a little hilly, so pulling a wagon can take a little energy.
Bucks County
Bucks County rivals Lancaster for bucolic scenery, but is more urbane in lifestyle. Gorgeous stone houses, some of which might be two hundred years old, are a common sight along with stunning rock walls.
The Gardens at Millfleurs, One Cafferty Rd, Pt. Pleasant, PA
This is a place to both tour -- for a fee -- and buy, although you can just buy too. Barbara Tiffany's plants are expensive. Everything about Barbara and husband Tiff's home and garden is exquisite and expensive. Tiff makes gorgeous furniture too.
Barbara does not dabble in the standard perennials or standard anything else. She and Tiff are collectors, especially fond of shade plants. If it is not interesting, rare or special, you won't find it here (be it plants, furniture, clothing). You will pay accordingly for plant material, but then again, it is special stuff.
Barbara and Tiff offer a variety of open tours on Saturdays from spring to early fall for $25 as well as other special events. Millfleur is cheaper than Longwood Gardens to visit and in many ways more interesting to ornamental gardeners because of the homelike setting. Well, maybe not like my home, but still. Divine.
Indiana
Esther's Benedict's Nursery, 5623 W. 1300 North, Nappanee, IN,46550 (574) 773-2254.
Nappanee is about twenty minutes southwest of South Bend (where a famous statue nicknamed Touchdown Jesus tries to help out the ailing Notre Dame football team). If you happen to find yourself anywhere close -- like Chicago, Grand Rapids, Ann Arbor -- go here. Close, to some of us, is defined by worthiness of the destination. I'd add over two hours for this nursery any day of the week. True, driving there was kind of dismal suburban scenery until I got close to Nappanee. Nappanee reminds me of Lancaster County but less hilly. Driving among the Amish and Mennonite farms brought smiles and anticipation to my face.
Open by appointment --despite Google's assertion of regular hours -- Esther is usually there and if so, you will be welcomed without a prior appointment, but call just in case it is a time when she is traveling. Forget Sundays.
Esther has a lovely small garden featuring troughs and rock gardens as well as a water feature that you can walk through. Her nursery is small, but it is a unicorn. She sells unusual perennials, alpines, miniatures, and rock garden plants with NO "internet" presence. She does not sell online, but if you can find her at a sale in a neighboring state (like Bob's Garden Fair in Dayton, OH every Labor Day Saturday) or visiting a rock garden meeting (why we join chapters elsewhere), you will be rewarded -- especially if you like smaller plants and great prices. A rock gardener's paradise, Esther has both shade and sun plants, plus a small variety of incredibly low priced shrubs and troughs. I came home with a boxful of tiny Heucheras, Astilbes, Verbascum, Valerian, and unusual varieties of thyme, Sanguisorba and many more! I will return.
Ohio
Groovy Plants Ranch, 4140 Co Rd 15, Marengo, OH 43334
Marengo is to the northeast of Columbus, Ohio, convenient to a trip to Cleveland, Akron etc. I confess that I found some way to add this to a return trip to Atlanta from Ann Arbor, where it is more off the road. I don't regret going for a one time look see, but I wouldn't regularly detour for it. But if you are traveling along I-71, I do recommend a visit to "lighten up" your trip with some smiles and giggles to be found here.
The plant material looks to be high quality. Prices are what you'd expect for an urban garden center, even though this is not uber close to Columbus.They did have some very impressive succulents and house plants for those interested in such. Prices for these seemed kind of precious but probably not to collectors.
So why go? This is an experiential nursery. Lots of funny vignettes and areas dot the large nursery. A coffee/tea truck resides in the parking area. They have tons of clever containers and garden art, a good deal of which I had never seen and certainly not in one place. Very photograph worthy and a good way to break up a long trip. But I'd be lying if I said it was about the plants.
Maybe a Spring trip would prove otherwise. They do have lots of events and festivals, art fairs, craft fairs, etc.
North Carolina
Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill
Plant Delights Nursery / Juniper Level Botanic Gardens, 9241 Sauls Rd, Raleigh, NC 27603.
Look on the website for open house days and special events/talks to visit or classes to take. Garden groups are often welcomed on days not calendared by prior arrangement.
Walking through Juniper Level Gardens on open days is a botanic treat, free of charge. Sun gardens, shade gardens, rock gardens abound. There are clever vignettes and signs hide throughout. There are unusual plants, rare plants (including native plants), plants you wonder if they are on steroids because they don't grow for you like that, and flat out fascinating plants. Plus there is one of the world's priciest nurseries on site.
To be fair, they are financing the garden which is slated to one day turn public. They are financing research, plant rescue and propagation of endangered species. Not everything is crazy priced, and you may want something so badly, you may not care. Been there, have the coffee mug, snow globe and t-shirt. And I will go again. Just go to look if not to buy. As if.
Sanford, NC
Big Bloomers Flower Farm, 275 Pressly Foushee Road, Sanford, NC 27330
Recommended to me by someone who frequently shops at Black Creek Greenhouses as "similar," I managed to get here one July. I was possibly coming through Raleigh on the way back from Philadelphia. This nursery is an hour from Plant Delights. It's sort of in the western void of well known towns between Charlotte and Raleigh.
This sizable nursery features a good selection of everything. Prices are good but short of great, although they look better when you are on the way back from Plant Delights. When I visited, it was very hot mid-summer and inventory was somewhat depleted from what I'd seen on offer in spring flyers. Next time, I'll try to go in spring or fall. It's not crazy off the road to add to a trip to the Research Triangle. Well, maybe it is. But It is clear that in Spring, they have a lot of plant material. I did bring home my lovely Salvia elegans 'Golden Delicious' from here as well as other "au courant" hard to find varieties of plants.
Asheville area
Sandy Mush Herb Farm, 316 Surrett Cove Rd., Leicester, North Carolina, 28748
Getting there is half the fun. I mean, you could download their catalog and supplement, check items off the order form and mail a check and wait for your plants to arrive, I suppose. Some people enjoy that. If you don't drive a four wheel drive car with some extra clearance off the ground, skip it. My Mazda 3 seemed to hold a grudge afterward, although it did get there and back.
Why take your car up a mountain side crossing a creek just to get to a nursery seeming to appear out of nowhere as you approach the summit? Literally, you will see one sign and just keep ascending. Halfway there, you will be certain you missed a turn somewhere. Nope, keep going. And going. And you will see it just before you think you never will.
Note that when you leave, you might want to have a real map in the car if you don't have a great reverse sense of direction or if you are like me, you tend to leave a different way than you came. You may go without phone signal for a while back down on terra firma. Note also that if you head toward I-40 directly without going back through the Asheville area, you will find yourself on some serious backroads with tight hairpin curves at points. Slow down and enjoy the scenery.
What's up there? Two large greenhouses built into the slope. Loads of plants, because most of what they grow are small -- in 4" pots. It would be hard to identify an herb they don't grow. But there is lots more than just herbs, plants that I never see in Atlanta like rockrose (Cistus), Lepechinia hastata, and Buddleja alternifolia and much more. There is a lovely garden or two to walk through to see some unusual plants too, like Podophyllum hexandrum, which is not only cool looking but contains amazing cancer thwarting chemicals. If you go in person, you will probably find some rare things to buy they don't have enough quantity to add into the catalog.
South Carolina
Shady Characters, 2771 Wire Road,Aiken, South Carolina 29805
(803) 269-3309
Open by appointment only, this nursery specializes in -- wait for it -- shady characters like Hostas, Heucheras, Tiarellas, ferns and hardy gingers along with many other plants that are unusual and hard to find. Oh, there are some sun plants, but yes, it is the shade plants that get the special attention. On our June 2023 trip, Georgia Perennial visitors were impressed with the quality, health and good prices of the plants, many not easy to find and very up to date cultivars. This family run nursery (and home) has some display gardens too (including poolside). About 11 miles outside of Aiken, we'd all go back again.
