Of course I've been buying!! What self-respecting plant geek/nursery person can restrain themselves when the new stock comes in in spring?

So far, I've mainly just been purchasing to fill in holes. Pieris 'Cavatine', Deutzia 'Nikko', 'Apricot Twist' erysimum (can't resist orange anything!), 4 new hellebores ( the result of a class I did earlier and couldn't resist my own sales pitch :)), another digiplexis to replace last season's (these are NOT perennial in my zone!!) and 3 more Euphorbia 'Ascot Rainbow'.

Also a couple of 'just had to haves' - Ilex crenata 'Jersey Jewel' and an orange flowered kangaroo paw (Anigozanthus) to go with my succulent collection.......the desert landscape alongside Puget Sound, as it were!!

Oh giant plant envy! I am in the bizarre situation of having heaps of land (and no money). Buying the odd plant here and there was a gigantic pleasure...and squeezing them into the tiny garden or even the allotment was always quite satisfying...whereas putting (expensive) plants into the wild woodland is sort of like setting ten pound notes alight and calling it a firework display. Even going down the seed route has it's limits since my 10x12feet greenhouse can only hold so many pots. All last year, I spent the entire season transporting little 3inch pots to the woods and planting out the seedlings. Even several thousand bulbs at a time makes a puny display...so it is all a waiting game for colonies to arise spontaneously from the little nudges I can manage...although 50 or so foxgloves are definitely bearing fruit - little seedlings are appearing everywhere I walked, (swinging dried out rattling flower stalks last September). So, annoyingly, I am sticking with the mundane, the common and especially the prolific...although I have been salivating over Annette's cardiocrinum and wondering 'what if'. When I first started gardening, according to horticultural lore, there were 2 mythical plants - the raising of which were conclusive proof that you had finally been elevated to the ranks of a 'real' gardener - the giant lily (cardiocrinum) and the blue poppy (meconopsis). Meconops were always going to be impossible in my dry and alkaline soil (although I tried, often) but cardiocrinums were a challenge too far.
Still, even valerian and buttercups, lunaria and filipendula are new to me and are poking little seedling leaves out of their pots - the thrill of growing never pales, however simple the task (just as well).

-GG, Although what we are really doing is not feeding into our plant obsessions. We are trialing for quality assurance, for the customers. ;-D It's not so bad if you look at it that way. Your mentioning hellebore reminded me that I went and ordered some. Naturally they are ones I currently do not possess (Apricot Blush, Black Diamond, & Red Sapphire).

-Camp, Lol what an expensive firework display indeed!

CMK

CMK, I love those plants you've highlighted there, especially the conifers... I'm fond of these dwarf types, and I've got my eye on a lodgepole Pine 'Chief Joseph'.. we can get this over here, and it turns bright yellow all winter... I think it's very slow growing... which is imperative for where I garden...

..the Iseli site looks interesting, I've been checking it out - no good to me of course...

...I'm always buying plants locally and online... the problem is choosing, there is so much choice and I always think that if I keep searching, there's a better variety to be had....

..congratulations on your promotion...

Finding hellebores do well in our back garden so spreading them around a bit.

'Anna's Red' and 'Merlin'.

-Mar, Thank you ;-) Chief Joseph is a nice one! I saw it at a vendor booth and it was impressive. I ordered a few 'Louie' Pines and they look much softer gold than CJ. I adore golden evergreens, but invariably there will be people who think they look dead! Lol. Do you have any specialty conifer places on your side of the pond that you enjoy buying from?

-SB, those are lovely. Those two cultivars have nice silver veining as well too I believe?

That is why early springtime is so dangerous for me....I go thru winter with all the dreariness and lack of gardening and then am presented with such an array of plants! Its like a starving man at a buffet. Then I try making excuses and the whole "I deserve this for surviving winter" comes into play and I end up gifting myself another plant. LOL.
CMK

the best gc in town closed so have been doing mail order first time in years. have ordered muhlenbergia white cloud, aconite sparks variety, thalictrum splendide-9 ft. with stems like purple patent leather-aruncus zweiweltenkind. weather has turned suddenly colder here-snow and rain but will go nurserying in the ca. foothills next week.

CMK... yeah, I used to live right near this one... Lime Cross Conifers

... just as well I moved away... but there are quite a few over here, spoilt for choice I think... and all my local gc's have a good range.... roses tend to come first these days but I try to find room for a little conifer here and there...

...I like Epimedium's too, my favourite is x rubrum, but my dog killed them off, now I only have x perralchicum Frohnleiten.... for the Spring foliage...

like this... I just adore it...

Re those two hellebore cultivars and "silvery veining".

CMK, you likely know more about it than me. I'm relatively new to hellebores, but both have part Helleborus lividus heritage. The latter has apparently passed its marbled leaves (it has silver/cream veining) on to some of it's progeny.

I'm reading "some marbling" for 'Merlin'. 'Anna's Red' (Rodney Daves Marbled Group) gets high praise from Perennial Resource. as having "incredibly unique spring foliage ---", "which emerges in spring bronzy green with electric pink veining"; "the marbling turns cream --" as the foliage matures.

I'm currently seeing veining on both plants now (colour?).

Too many to mention...

Excellent CMK!

(I have ordered very little. This past weekend I bought on-line 3 "Minnie Pearl" phlox paniculata and 1 Uvularia grandiflora).

(It is because of the far reaching influence ie enabling of GW that I have many epimediums and Helleborus).

LOL, don't get me started on Hellebores they can be down right addictive. I don't have many named varieties other than 'Onyx Odyssey', 'Ashwood Double White', 'Ashwood Double Pink' and H. foetidus 'Wester Flisk'. A few years back I grew seed from Ashwood in the U.K. and got a nice mix of colors....

DS2 was up from Victoria the other day, showed me some pictures of the double Hellebore they grew, almost had me drooling :). The seed again from Ashwood in the U.K. needless to say mom sent him home with baggies with instructions to bag some of those flowers as soon as he stepped out of his truck. Yep they are addicting.

Annette