What We’ve Learned About The Industry of Gardening
(and how it changed our entire business plan)
When we started out in 2020 I thought my biggest learning curve would be educating myself on the tricks of gardening, in fact, the biggest eye-opener - and challenge, has been reconciling the gardening industry with the art of gardening.
There was a lot of naivety on my part coming into this. I thought plants were plants, that everything sold at a nursery must be inherently good for gardens, and that I could trust the process behind it all.
I was wrong.
As I dug deeper, I realized how much of what’s offered is shaped by convenience, and encouraging quick or impulse purchases at the garden centre—not necessarily what’s best for gardeners, garden sustainability, or the ecology in general.
These lessons, as they unfolded, threw me off kilter personally - but most importantly, once digested, crystallized our direction as a business. We’ve created a niche that almost sits outside of the industry, working to reconnect gardening with its roots as evolving, creative expressions in nature, that feed the human spirit.
Here are some of the trends that are shaping modern horticulture - and I’ve seen some of these become more prevalent in just a few years…
1. The Trade-Offs of Breeding
Modern plants are often bred to enhance traits like longer blooms, brighter colours, or compact growth. But these improvements often come at a cost—sometimes to the plant’s ecological value, but also to its usability and enjoyment in the garden.
Examples:
Sterility for Longer Blooms: To extend bloom times, plants like coreopsis and black-eyed Susans (Rudbeckia) are sometimes bred to be sterile. While this prevents aggressive spreading, it also means gardeners can’t collect seeds, and the pollinators can’t benefit from the nectar.
Fragrance for New Colours: Lilacs and peonies bred for unique colours, like yellow or coral, often lose their signature fragrance—I first realized this as a researched why my beautiful Coral Charm had no scent. Indeed, the gorgeous colour comes at the sacrifice of scent.
Growth for Usability: Double blooms in zinnias or coneflowers may look appealing, but they often make it harder for pollinators to access nectar and are typically short-lived.
Why It Matters:
These trade-offs may mean you can’t collect seeds, enjoy a plant’s fragrance, or rely on it to thrive year after year. If longevity, self-sowing, or traditional sensory elements are important to you, you can no longer make the same old assumptions when it comes to modern plants.
2. Not All Plants Behave As The OG - aka The Species
Many gardeners assume they can collect seeds or rely on plants to self-seed in their garden - traditional coneflowers, hollyhocks, foxglove…. But with modern hybrids, these assumptions don’t always hold true. Highly bred varieties often behave differently than older cultivars or wild species, including being sterile and/or patented.
Examples:
Self-Seeding Limitations: A hybrid foxglove - like ‘Arctic Rose’ might bloom for months, but it will fail to reseed, leaving gaps in the garden where you expected new plants to return each year through self-seeding.
Seed Collection Restrictions: Patented plants like Echinacea ‘Cheyenne Spirit’ come with legal restrictions. Gardeners aren’t allowed to propagate them by seed, cuttings, or division—even for personal use. So, the cops may not show up on your door but it does mean small growers - like us, can’t propagate and re-sell, nor can you trade or sell for other varieties. All roads lead back to the breeder. We totally appreciate that breeding can mean progress, but many gardeners don’t truly understand the implications.
Through our own observation, the number of patented plants has surged in just 5-years. In our first year I could choose from a generous section of perennials from the grower catalog, and about 50% were patented. Within 2-years, the perennial options were mere pages in a book of crayon coloured annuals and they were all patented.
This was a real turning point for me. It sent me down a rabbit hole that resulted in an almost total shift away from ‘the industry’ to growing our own through seed and propagation.
Why It Matters:
If you’re used to letting your garden evolve naturally through self-sowing, seed collection, plant division for yourself - or to barter with friends, modern nursery plants, may no longer support that.
It is now more the exception than the rule, for you to find a patent-free, open-pollinated plant in your Big Box Garden Centre or local large nursery.
3. The Role of Chemicals in Plant Production
Behind the flawless plants in garden centers is often a heavy reliance on chemicals and unnatural tactics. From seed to store, pesticides, fungicides, and synthetic fertilizers are widely used to ensure plants look healthy and uniform. While these inputs protect plants during production, they can have lasting implications for gardeners and the environment.
Examples:
Forced Lighting: Many growers will use extended lighting to ‘force’ a plant to bloom before it’s time to be retail ready for peak purchases. This favours bloom over roots, trading short-term gains, for long-term plant health. These early blooming beauties aren’t likely to last in your garden.
Heavy Pesticide Use: Nurseries often apply pesticides and fungicides to keep plants pest-free during growing, shipping and storage. These residues may linger on the plants, potentially affecting pollinators and soil organisms in your own garden.
Synthetic Fertilizers: Plants grown with synthetic fertilizers may look vigorous but often depend on continuous feeding. Once planted in natural garden soil, they may struggle to adapt or thrive without additional inputs.
Why It Matters:
For gardeners who prioritize organic practices or want to create pollinator-friendly spaces, these chemically dependent plants are ironically counterproductive. Residues can disrupt the balance of your garden’s soil and harm the very wildlife the plants were meant to attract.
4. “Disposable” Perennials
Perennials are traditionally valued for their longevity, but many modern varieties are bred for short-term performance. These “disposable” perennials are designed to deliver instant beauty for impulse retail purchase. The industry doesn’t hide this - their public videos are unapologetically more focused on ‘POS’ (Point of Sale) attraction than garden health.
Examples:
Hybrid Coneflowers: Modern Echinacea hybrids often live for only 3–5 years - at best, compared to species-level plants that can thrive for decades.
Ornamental Salvias: Some salvias bred for compact growth or unique colours may lack the hardiness of their species counterparts, leading to shorter lifespans.
Why It Matters:
Short-lived perennials mean more time, money, and effort spent on replacements. For gardeners looking to build a lasting garden, these plants can be more a temporary fix rather than a long-term investment. The line between annuals and perennials starts to blur.
5. The Globalization of Gardening
The globalized nature of the garden industry has streamlined plant production, but it also comes with hidden costs for gardeners and the environment. Many plants are grown far from where they will eventually be sold, often in industrialized systems that prioritize efficiency over resilience.
Examples:
Plugs and Starter Plants: Many young plants (plugs) are started in third-world countries, where labor is cheaper, and then shipped to industrial greenhouses in other parts of the world to be “grown on” before sale. This practice minimizes costs but can introduce diseases or pests and relies heavily on chemical inputs during transport and production.
Long Supply Chains: Plants often travel thousands of miles before reaching nurseries, creating a significant environmental footprint and making local adaptation less likely - even those marketed as ‘natives’.
Why It Matters:
Plants bred or grown in entirely different conditions often struggle to adapt to local climates, leaving gardeners frustrated when they fail to thrive; and for those new gardeners that start for ecological reasons - for example replacing their turf, they may be surprised - and disheartened, to learn the miles their plant has travelled.
What Can Gardeners Do?
Understanding these trends doesn’t mean you need to overhaul your entire garden. Making small, informed choices can go a long way towards building a garden that’s both enjoyable and sustainable. Here are some practical steps to get started:
Learn About Your Plants: Look beyond the label to understand if a plant is sterile, patented, chemically treated, or bred in conditions far from your local climate. Your nursery should be able to answer this. It doesn’t mean you don’t buy it, but your expectations are appropriately set from the start.
Support Local Nurseries: Smaller growers often carry plants better adapted to your region, with fewer - or no (in our case), chemical inputs and shorter supply chains. Note: if the local nursery brags on social media about the ‘truckload of plants’ that just arrived, those are plant re-sellers, not local growers.
Mix Natives with Non-Natives: Natives provide ecological value, while the right non-invasive non-natives can also support ecology and add colour, texture, and diversity to your garden. Get a balance that works for you.
Choose Open-Pollinated Plants: These plants maintain genetic diversity, allowing you to collect seeds and grow plants that perform reliably year after year.
Defer Bloom Gratification: Until consumers stop opening their wallets for the eye-candy of retail blooms, nothing will change. Understand the basic principle that perennials have a finite blooming period AND you want that clock to start in your garden, not in the garden centre.
Conclusion
When I first started, I followed what felt like the standard path—ordering plugs, trusting that nursery plants were the best option, and assuming everything sold was good for the garden. But as I learned more about the trends shaping modern horticulture, I realized how much of the process didn’t align with what I wanted to create: gardens that endure, thrive naturally, and support both the gardeners and the ecosystems around them.
This shift in understanding dramatically changed how we approach everything here on the farm. Instead of relying on pre-grown plugs, we now grow almost entirely from seed. It’s not just about reducing reliance on industrial systems—it’s about reclaiming independence, and ensuring the plants we offer are resilient and healthy.
We still offer limited varieties of some of those patented, sterile varieties we mentioned, because we also believe in choice - and education. We clearly label where a plant is patented - and will add a premium price. We’ll also label clearly if it’s Sterile, or if it’s ‘Tender’ - i.e. short-lived.
We created Plant Sets to make navigating this easier for our customers. For example, if you choose plants from our Foundation Set you can be assured that they’re long-blooming, long-lasting perennials that aren’t sterile or patented. If you don’t want to think further about it you can stop there and select from those 50+ plants. But if you’re OK with short blooms or want decorative drama choose from our Core and Select sets as well. It’s about choice, based on knowledge.
Gardening - and our gardening business, is a reflection of what we value. For us, it’s about helping our customers create spaces that last, and reconnect us with the natural world.
I hope sharing what we’ve learned along the way inspires you to look deeper and make your own garden not just a beautiful space, but one that truly lasts.
