Plant Sales List

Important Notes, please read;

We are pleased to offer the following trees, shrubs, and organically grown perennials for 2023.
The nursery is open only on the weekends by appointment only. Please, no drop in visits, I am not always on site.
Please keep dogs in your vehicle.
It is strongly recommended that you submit a list of plants you are interested before you visit. Not everything is in stock all the time and inventory changes rapidly.
Plants can be picked up any time using our self-serve option after a pre-arranged date, time, and payment are discussed.
Prices and availability subject to change.
PLANT WARRANTY; we guarantee our plants to be alive and well when you purchase them. If you find otherwise, please let us know and we will replace the plant with another one (if available), give you nursery credit, or give you your money back.
Performance issues once the plants are in the landscape are a bit more subjective; promptly let us know when you start having issues-together, we will figure out what’s going and find a mutually agreeable solution. The plants you spend your money on are both a financial and ecological investment that benefits everybody when they succeed.

Trees and Shrubs

-Not all of our woody plants are seed grown; some are vegetatively propagated from stem cuttings and root pieces. We try to source and grow as much seed started woodies as possible.

-Please contact us with your tree and shrub wish list; we will reply with available sizes and pricing when they are not listed below the description. (Last year was a roller coaster ride, and it was impossible to keep the sizing and price information accurate on many species.)

Abies balsamea, Balsam fir

Highly adaptable tree that can live in cool dense forested wetlands to much drier upland white pine forests. Certain trees take on a prostrate (ground hugging) growth pattern, forming more of a ground cover. Stiff dark green needles give the tree a rather rigid stance. Plant in thickets to provide outstanding cover and protection for our feathered friends. Cones develop on the tippy top where they are harvested by squirrels and cached away for a critical food source in the lean winter months. Makes a great Christmas tree too. Why don’t we see more of these in our landscapes?

2.5ft -3 ft in height, 2 gallon pot size; $40 each

Amelanchier canadensis, Shadbush: Small tree/large shrub; produces a flush of bright white flowers in the early spring before much else is going on; birds feast on the red berries that come out later in the summer; attractive smooth gray bark; does best in part sun, rich loamy soils with ample moisture.; 2 gal size, “16”-18″ tall on avg, well branched, $20.00

Arctostaphylos uva-ursi, Bear berry

An outstanding little shrub that will grow in some really tough situations. I have seen it growing at the base of Mount Kineo in Moosehead Lake in broken up rock and a little bit of soil. I find it growing sporadically in the dry acidic woods here in southern Maine. There is one spot where the plants are growing on ledge outcrops in less than 1 inch of soil and appear to be quite content. Never more than a few inches off the ground, this adventurous plant is always looking for more ground to occupy, albeit slowly. Consider using bearberry in place of non-native ground covers like those big box store junipers and those dastardly Vinca’s. We typically offer the ‘Massachusetts’ variety. For what ever reason, a non-varietal offering is hard to come by.

1 gallon pot size; $40 each.

1 quart (SP4 plug size); $20 each

Aronia melanocarpa, Black chokeberry: Highly adaptable shrub, growing in both saturated wetlands and bone dry sandy soils, tends to remain more compact in the latter; tart berries are loaded with beneficial phytochemicals; dark colored anthers contrast against bright white flower petals.; 3ft to 4 ft high, 1 gallon pots; $42.00 each

Cephalanthus occidentalis, Button bush

Grows in wetland areas full sun to nearly full shade, masses of spherical flower clusters attract lots of pollinators, particularly attractive to large butterflies like Fritillaries and Yellow swallowtails. It does quite well in upland soils but needs a good amount of shade and organic matter. I find it growing in and around vernal pools, when these areas are flooded in the spring amphibians such as salamanders and frogs will use the stems of button bush to anchor their eggs. Ducks eat the seeds that develop in the fall.

15″-18″ high, 2 gallon pot size; $32.00 each.

Clethra alnifolia Summer sweet, Pepperbush

This is such a common plant in the trade, it is hard to believe that it’s a rare native plant for the state of Maine; southern Maine is at the northern end of this plant’s natural range. When you get further south into New England it becomes very common. It has a strong association with gravelly cobble that can be found around certain lakes and ponds here in southern Maine. In cultivation it grows well in loamy garden soil that has good moisture retention. Intensely fragrant flowers remind one of a narcissus, a sort of stinky-sweet. Pollinators, including hummingbirds, love them. Multi-stemmed growth habit typically growing waist high.

-Contact us for a quote on current sizes and pricing.

Comptonia peregrina, Sweet fern

It’s not a fern and it’s not sweet, but it’s a really wonderful pioneering plant capable of growing in poor, sandy soils. Attractive leaves have a spicy minty scent when crushed. A friend of ours, Elder Ron, says that a tincture of the leaves, attached to your clothing, will keep mosquitoes away. Nitrogen fixing bacteria reside in root nodules; these help parent plants and also adds nitrogen to the soil for future plant establishment. Spreading colonies stabilize soils. Another good choice for hell strips.

-Contact us for a quote on current sizes and pricing.

Cornus (Swida) ammomum, Silky dogwood, red willow

Forms thickets along shaded stream banks and wooded wet areas. I have several patches that grow along my road and they always produce large amounts of attractive blue drupes (fruit). Birds and other critters must really like them because the fruit disappears quickly after ripening. This is a great example of a plant that creates both habitat and food. The dense thickets are wrapped in a cloak of leaves during the growing season rendering birds almost invisible. Branches tend to grow outward and downward from a multi stemmed axis, making a complex three dimensional shelter.

-Contact us for a quote on current sizes and pricing.

Cornus (Swida) racemosa, Gray dogwood

Another thicket forming species of dogwood that will make a naturalistic looking drift. A good choice for a piece of the landscape that needs to be occupied by a wildlife friendly shrub. Fruit is white in color and comes out a bit earlier than other dogwoods. Attractive red colored fruit stems hang on after the fruit disappears. Fruit said to be consumed by at least 100 species of song birds. Also said to be a preferred browse for deer (isn’t everything?!), which may or may not be a good thing. Maybe this could be used to feed the deer instead of your garden or other plants? Will live in sun to part shade, dry to moist soils.

18″-24″ high, 2-3 gallon pots; $24 each

Cornus (Swida) sericea, Red osier dogwood

Revered for its bright red branches that add a bold kick to the winter landscape, especially when piercing a blanket of snow. Similar habit to silky and gray dogwood, it forms dense tangled thickets in wet areas in the wild, but takes well to upland situations in our gardens. Reported to be invasive at times when it makes its way into fields. Many varieties have been selected from this species to try to attain the brightest red stems, interestingly, yellow stem color varieties have also been selected. In the wild, stem color is usually a dulled down red to brownish yellow color.

-Contact us for a quote on current sizes and pricing.

Diervilla lonicera, Bush honeysuckle

Honeysuckles! Our first thought is non-native invasive Asiatic species like Morrow’s. We can relax, we do have a few native species of honeysuckle, like this one. Bush honeysuckle can be found in shade to sun, it competes best in dry, well drained, poor soils (who hasn’t got those conditions in at least a few places on their property?); attractive yellow flowers turn orange after they are pollinated. With time, forms nice drifts of multi-stemmed plants, looks particularly good when planted on hillsides. The height of this shrub is one of its most useful features in the landscape, it fills the size niche that few other shrubs can; its not a creepy crawly like bear berry, a bit taller and less persnickety to get established than low bush blueberry. The size can be a disadvantage for the attention deficit gardener, as it can be quickly out gunned by taller growing brambles, invasives, and natives. Keep it cleared of competition for best results, and watch it evolve into dreamy drifts.

-Bare root plants being potted up this spring, contact us if interested.

Hamamelis virginiana, Witch hazel

Tall multi-stemmed under story shrub of deciduous forests. I have one growing in my front yard that started its life in shade, but is now in full sun for most of the day. It is doing okay, but its leaves look stressed much of the time now. Interestingly, it now seems to set seed every year. Plants growing in the deep shade only set seed once every 3 to 5 years. Leaves have been used for centuries as a powerful astringent for toning the skin and taking care of ailments in more discrete places. Crepe paper like pastel yellow flowers come in late fall, well after every other shrub has finished fruiting, much less flowering. This plant has a long, bizarre, and unique seed development period; flowers are pollinated in the fall by moths, after fertilization, embryo development goes dormant throughout the winter and resumes at some point in the spring. Seeds mature in the fall of the proceeding year. The seeds will then take two years to germinate after going through a cold-warm-cold-warm cycle. Wow. Why? How? How did the flowering of this plant get set back so far into the season? We can only speculate.

-12″-15″ high, 2 gallon pot size; $25 each

Ilex verticilata, Winter berry

A very common shrub of wetlands and poorly drained areas. I have a wonderful scrub-shrub/Black tupelo wetland in back of my house that is thickly forested with winter berry. It is a sanctuary for wildlife year round; a delightful chorus of bird song through out the summer; chickadees and hares flit through the branches above and below in the winter. It seems to be an important anchor species, certainly a dominant one. It shares ground with high bush blueberry, choke berry, mountain holly, male berry, and shad bush. I have always looked to mother nature for guidance; here she shows us the many companion plants that work well together, we can use this as a template to guide our efforts in our yards. During the growing season, this is not a very showy species. In the winter it lights up like a neon light, those bright red berries burning bright in the other wise dull landscape. Dainty flowers are barely noticeable, but they are to bees and other pollinators who show up in surprising numbers. Male and female plants. Since this species is grown for the berries, many varieties of this plant are geared towards production of known males and females.

12″-15″ high, 2 gallon pot size; $24 each (unsexed).

Juniperus communis, Pasture Juniper

We native plant folks are always on our soapbox telling you “Don’t plant this, plant this! You don’t have to plant those non-native cultivar box box store junipers, you can plant one of our wonderful native ground covers, pasture juniper! Yes, it is a bit slow growing, but in the blink of an eye that scabby piece of land that nothing else will grow on will be covered in a luxurious, albeit prickly undulating sea of blue green tranquility. Pasture juniper rolls across the landscape like a carpet, providing habitat and food for all manner of animals. Needs full sun and dry well drained soils to be happy. I’m happy to finally be able to offer this one, I have been recommending it for years…………

15″-18″ high, 3 gallon pot size, $45 each

Juniperus virginiana, Eastern red cedar

Slow growing, medium sized conifer tolerant of poor sandy and salty soils; found growing on the coastline here in southern Maine, the further south you go the more common it becomes inland; full sun. The Marginal Way sea-side trail in Ogunquit, Maine has a number of old specimens flanking the trail that you can go see. There is even a grove of them where you can sit and watch the ocean roll by. These plants are seed grown.

18″-24″ high, 1-2 gallon pot size; $20 each

Larix laracina, Tamarack

This is a deciduous conifer; we associate conifers as being evergreen, like pines and hemlocks, but not this one. The needle shedding probably evolved as a way to manage water loss in the long cold winters of its preferred northern climes. The flexible, soft green needles aren’t coated with the thick waxy layer that most evergreen conifers have. Needles turn a beautiful golden color before dropping in the fall. It is uncommon here in southern Maine, but increases in abundance the further north you travel. Grows in wetlands in the wild, but adapts well to upland areas. Really quite a striking specimen tree.

-2ft to 2.5 ft high, 2 gallon pot size; $40 each.

Lindera benzoin, Spicebush

Splendid medium to large shrub of shady forested wetlands. At the northern end of its range here in southern Maine, it’s starting to pop up more and more (am I getting better at noticing it or is the range extending northward?), bright little yellow flowers cover the branches in early spring, scarlet red berries in September are relished by birds, male and female plants, THESE PLANTS ARE UN-SEXED. Delicate greenish blue leaves have that distinctive spicy sweet smell when rubbed or crushed. Host plant for the spicebush swallowtail butterfly. Grows well in loamy garden soils with shade.

–Bare root plants being potted up this spring, contact us if interested.

Myrica pennsylvanicum, Bayberry or Wax berry

Early colonists to New England were said to have removed the waxy coating from the berries to make into candles. (I have always wanted to try this myself, wouldn’t that be cool, wax berry candles.) Typically found above the high tide line where they can make a living despite the insults the ocean throws at them. Tolerant of salt, quick draining sandy soils, low soil fertility, and low moisture levels. An exceptional selection when you have spots that won’t grow much else. This is a perfect substitute for rugosa rose, which is pretty, but not native, and arguably invasive. Birds love the berries in the fall. Unsexed plants.

-12″-15″ high, 2 gallon pot size; $34 each (unsexed)

Nyssa sylvatica, Black Tupelo, Button bark

These trees have fascinated me for as long as I’ve known about them. Mature specimens form striking silhouette against the sky as the branching structure is compact and angular. They do not have the arching well developed canopies that oaks and maples do. They remind me of the baobab trees in Africa; huge trunks but not much branching. Male and female trees, females produces blue fruit high in the canopy that are coveted by birds. Typically found in wetlands, but like so many of our natives, they will grow happily in upland soils. Fall color is a spectacular red inferno. At the northern limit of its range here in southern Maine, where it is uncommon but not rare.

2ft-2.5 ft high, 2 gallon pot size; $40 each

Picea glauca, White Spruce

One of a trio of native spruce trees (black and red spruce being the other two) that we have growing in the southern Maine area. Each one grows in a specific habitat. This is the more common of them, growing in many of the inland forested wetlands. Grows to about 30 to 40 feet, when in wetlands, shorter when growing in uplands. My dad planted one in our field at least 40 years ago, if not more, it is doing well, but is barely 20 feet tall. This is common among wetland plants; they grow tall and skinny in their wetland habitats, and stay shorter when in upland areas. Fantastic shelter for birds, seeds provide an important food source for birds and mammals. Seeds are heavily predated by seed eating insects, which are probably fed upon by birds and other animals; the circle of life….

-Contact us for a quote on current sizes and pricing.

Picea marinara, Black Spruce

This spruce is picky about where it grows; most commonly associated with kettle hole bogs and other open sphagnum bogs. They seem to be intolerant of competing tree growth, and will die back if infringed upon by other woody species. Tend to have a stunted growth form, looking like miniature trees, even though they are decades old. This is due to nutrient restrictive environments of the acidic bogs that they grow in. I haven’t tried growing these in upland areas, but I bet they would take, probably keeping that stunted bonsai look.

-Contact us for a quote on current sizes and pricing.

Picea rubra, Red Spruce

Grows in two very different places in Maine, but not in between; along the immediate coast and in the mountains. What is it about these two seemingly dissimilar habitats that appeal to this species? I’ll have to ask one of the trees next time I see one. Slender growing tree to about 20-30 feet. Said to be good for making musical instruments like violins. As all of our native spruce, they provide excellent habitat for birds and provide food for a great number of animals. Don’t plant poorly suited Colorado blue spruce or other non-native conifers if you live by the ocean, make the natural choice and plant red spruce.

-Contact us for a quote on current sizes and pricing.

Pinus strobus, White pine

Maine is the Pine Tree State due to the ubiquity of this species. The pine cone and tassel is the state flower. (Evidently, somebody didn’t consult with a botanist to be told that pines are gymnosperms, and gymnosperms do not bear flowers, but oh well.) Big tall growing trees long used for their excellent lumber. The legendary King’s Pines were used for masts on British sailing ships back in the colonial days and before. They have wonderful wildlife qualities too, providing habitat and food for so many animals. I have been recommending white pines more and more now, especially to replace hemlocks due to the hemlock woolly adelgid becoming more prevalent here in southern Maine. Makes a nice border hedge, more airy then the stiffer growing spruces.

-Wide range of sizes typically available, please contact us for a quote on current sizes and pricing.

Prunus maritima, Beach plum: Dune dwelling shrub of the Atlantic coast; tolerates the salty sandy bare bones beach sand and thrives in garden loam; provides food for many animal species; prolific bloomers- excellent pollinator plant in the spring and lots of critters feed on the plums in the fall; plums make delicious jams and jellies; needs full sun, anything less stunts growth. Rarely encountered in the wild anymore, certainly due to rampant coastal development, but also, perhaps, to natural scarcity to begin with here in southern Maine.