No experience; I wouldn't order from a company with that kind of review history.

The perennial forum link is
forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/peren/msg011734184614.html

and the daves garden reviews are at the link below.

Here is a link that might be useful: GMT at Garden Watchdog

I've seen references to people going to visit Green Mt. Transplants to pick out plants and avoid the shipping, substitution, and timing issues. However, their website has nothing about visitors. Has anyone gone there and how was it?

Thanks in advance!
Babs

Babs,
A friend went shortly before or after their move and was surprised by how low the stock was but was thrilled with the prices. My feeling is the qualities of all nurseries fluctuate and it is impossible to judge from year to year. Are you planning a trip? I have been thinking about a trip to Boothbay Me this summer to check out the Coastal Maine Botanical Gardens; perhaps if you combined a visit there with a trip to Green Mountain in Arundal, Me, it might make the trip less of a gamble. kt

I think they don't function in the way that one associates with a retail nursery. Retails nurseries maintain a supply of plants right through to the fall. My impression is that Green Mountain seems to just plant and stock for spring shipping. When their supply of a particular plant runs out, that's that. What they sell is starter plants in starter containers so this makes sense. I would travel up there in May or early June, but wouldn't make a road trip up there later in the season for fear of disappointment. I believe I once visited them in Vermont, but have never been to their Maine location.

Hi Everyone,
As I said, I have ordered from them several times, and twice I cancelled because I couldn't get the order on time even though I ordered 2.5 months previously.
So, I asked for people who did order in spring08 to report their actual experience.
Thanks

UPDATE: We were able to go to Green Mountain Transplants yesterday. This will be my last trip there. I have always found them to be disorganized and a hit or miss proposition, mailing to be impossible, but this year they are worse than ever. Not only did they not manage to get their website up and running but there was no current catalog to order from. Which didn't matter because they only had the same p*lant offerings from the old catalog.

I had a list of 43 items I was looking for and I came home with 13. A few plants were unavailable but for the most part they looked awful so I passed them by.

The store itself is a mess. Actually dirty and stuff thrown everywhere. It is an Agway store and they do seem to have an inventory, but it made me crazy the way it was disorganized and I had a number of items I could have looked for while I was there, but I was ready to get out of there.

So if anyone discovers a nursery that sells plugs of annuals and perennials, I'm looking for a new place to shop for next year.

Too bad, huh? Sounds like there was a change in management or serious family illness if they couldn't get a catalogue out. They had such a good business. Perhaps it is also an example of a company that couldn't quite make the switch to computers.

It is a shame, I think there was a lot of interest in that kind of nursery that offers plugs of specialty a*nnuals and p*erennials so reasonably priced. Although some of the more popular varieties were more expensive. I bought a 'Black Negligee' Cimicifuga that was the most expensive plug I bought at $6.75. 'Spring Symphony' Tiarella was $4.50 but if I had bought one at the usual places they would have been $10 - $15 easy. Most of the other 2 inch pots were $2-3.

What I especially liked was that instead of selling flats they sell individual plugs for $.55 to $.65 so you could mix and match and it would end up costing you $3-4 for a flat but you got what you needed. I have a small vegetable g*arden and I can't use 6 of something sometimes. I bought good looking Heliotrope for $.65 each. Russell's up in Sudbury had Heliotrope for $15. a large flat of 4 last time I checked and some nurseries that are closest to me didn't even have it. They had 2 inch pots of Glassworks C*oleus for $2. But some of the offerings haven't changed in a few years.

You could be right, that there was illness in the family or some crisis recently, but my interaction with the management and observations over a four year span, were that they were always limited in organizational skills. Definitely lacking in c*omputer skills too. It seemed that someone had a passion for growing....propagating and starting seeds but maybe just didn't have the business savy.

I really don't know of another nursery that fits that niche. I may have to make more of an effort to start my own seeds. I have winter sown and that works for most things, but then you still have C*oleus that is only available in very limited varieties from seed and I'm usually looking for 'proven winner' type annuals that you can't find seed for. Tomatoes are just too small if you start from seed using the winter sowing method. Although this year it probably would have worked out fine.

Well, I have at least 6 months to think about it. [g]

PM2, thanks for the update - although I was sad to hear it. This was a company that I wanted to hear good things about, because in theory it seems like a wonderful place where one could get good things at a good price. I have put off ordering from them for years and will probably not ever bother, now.

But I also wanted to mention that WSing is a wonderful way to start tomatoes! Yes, the seedlings are small, but they really, honestly do catch up. Last year, the year of the 40 days and 40 nights of rain, (actually, more like 90 days and nights of rain!) I planted out my poor little WSown seedlings and they looked very pathetic next to a greenhouse-grown tomato a friend had given me. Her tomato was a good 12 inches tall, nice and full, while mine were literally about 2 to 3 inches, with four to six little leaves (in June!). In a few weeks, my tomatoes had outgrown hers. I was amazed.

Coleus... well, while I have had success WSing it, it *is* much slower and does not begin to shine until late summer, even fall. Perhaps you could WS some, and then take cuttings in the fall to have bigger plants the following spring?

If anyone finds a place like GMT only better, please share. That would be a great find!

:)
Dee

Dee, of course you are right, I've started tomatoes winter sown a couple of times and they did grow and produce in the end, but I thought I might get earlier harvest with something a little larger. I think that I'm probably remembering 2 or 3 bad summers for tomatoes, too. [g] I'll try them again.

Coleus from seed is usually the 'Wizard' series or similar and I've grown very tired of it. I like to find new varieties from year to year so I'll just have to keep purchasing those. But taking cuttings to increase them is a good idea. Now if I could just execute better with all the great ideas I end up with. [g]

I'm definitely going to get back to Winter Sowing next year. I took this year off, but I missed it.

Thanks, Dee.