hand on tight.. here we go .... lol .. ken

Wow, I'm happy for you.

Have a great time playing in the dirt!

you've got some good looking pips..

Yes Jo, grinning from ear to ear and the dark winter mood gone away. Ken is always hitting the spot, had to laugh myself :-)

Saija, my friend Renaat is always sending so many pips that it is nearly impossible to count...

zkathy, I love to play around with the dirt, I really miss it in winter and wish I could also play around outside a little bit, but the ground is still frozen in the shadier parts of the garden.

I hope I can send you all looking to the HL more than once :-) There are a few names that I had to look up myself when he send the proposal.

It's an interesting way to buy. He sends me a list what he is planning to divide and I often need the HL for pictures. Had never heard of Cally White or Funny Bones for example...initially I only asked him for Dinky Donna :-)

The best thing is that I had to pay only 215€ for all 31 including freight.

Look at all the purple pips of Celtic Dancer, looks like some sort of exotic beetles...

Now I wait for better weather, it is still cold and wet...

It IS an interesting way to buy! The biggest advantage is that you are getting divisions (very generous ones) from established plants without having to wait years for the plant to achieve a decent size. Love that aspect of purchasing in this way.

Inexpensive and big, best way to get hostas. Don't you have groups over there specializing in exchanging plants? I'm a member of different fb groups, not only hostas. This way I have access to a wide range of plants that I would not get easily otherwise. People buy expensive plants and to reduce the costs they share divisions, works nice for both buyer and seller. Or you can simply exchange something, then you only have to pay the freight costs.

Wow, I want to belong to a club like yours! No I don't know of any clubs here that work on that system--anyone please let me know if they exist! (I belong to the send a lot of cash for new plants club) I do however have lots of "free" maples and oaks which are carefully planted by the wind and the squirrels in my containers.

Also looked up Funny Bones--what a great name never heard of it. How big is the Dinky Donna that you got?

Hi miles, I was always wondering why there are no groups for sharing hostas in the US. I found some trade groups but nothing compared to the one I'm in here in Europe. Especially in a garden forum like this it should be possible to exchange plants. Ok, the ways are much longer und you need to trust your friends to send healthy plants. Or maybe the gardens are so big that people need all their divisions for themselves...I simply have been lucky that I have found this guy. He is one of the admins of the group and welcomed me and he patiently answers all my questions :-)

How about the societies and garden clubs, don't they exchange plants?

Dinky Donna had 5 eyes, I hope it will look nice soon.

Funny Bones...interesting name, that's the picture my friend sent me...

Having free trees by the relentless work of squirrels is not so bad either :-)

The trade groups used to exist on Gardenweb. There may still be some. However, hosta virus X killed the trade group on this hosta forum. When I first started posting, there were people still discussing the demise of the group.

Ken and Babka probably know more about it than I do.

bkay