Catalog Update
I have had a few inquiries from folks checking out the new (and under construction) parts of the webstore. I know it looks like everything is sold out but the quantities will soon be updated when the bulb harvest is complete! Lot’s of great stuff coming in this summers offering, so stay tuned the catalog will be out in the next few weeks along with some announcements of fall sales events!
Fritillaria affinis, the vancouver island form
The online store is proving to be quite the time consuming piece of work, getting all the images uploaded from years of growing, writing descriptions, sorting and even having to learn a bit of code to make the website functional. I never thought I would have to learn computer coding to be a horticulturalist but such is the way of the world now days. It’s either keep up with technology or get left behind!
Besides the bulbs which will be offered in plenty soon, as I hope to start the harvest first thing next week. We will have an awesome selection of alpines available as well. Check out the front page of the website for some fall sales announcements! One plant I’m super excited to introduce is one that I have grown for a number of years. I sold it as Penstemon barrettieae for years but after this springs open gardens I had a number of botanists and keen plants people discussing the plant and we all came to the conclusion that it is a hybrid. So i’ve named it in honor of my good friend and mentor who taught me so much, Jack Poff. Jack was Rae Selling Berry’s gardener during her twilight years. He had so many great stories of Rae’s cantankerous gardening quirks, even telling me how she would have him drive up to Mt. Hood in fall, well up into the snow zone and she would have him bury flats of her most cherished alpine seeds for winter stratification. In the spring he would make the drive again and try to remember which tree he had hid them behind. As a much younger man, Jack told me how he helped Mrs. Berry convert the rock garden from a series of raised beds built with doug fir poles, to what became the legendary 1/4 acre show peice that was her backyard.
I started working as in intern at the Berry Botanic Garden around 2000, and Jack was retired at the time, but something of an emeritus. He was always making collecting trips out into the mountains and woods, bringing back cuttings of choice rock garden plants, dwarf willows (which he had a large fondness of), and seeds for me to try. I was hired as the propagator shortly after finishing my undergraduate degree and Jack and I spent his twilight years growing all sorts of awesome plants at the Berry. I had some great trips with him up to Mt. Hood, where he knew every great plant spot like the back of his hand. To the wildflower meadows and bogs of on the flanks of Mt. Adams. Jack imparted so much knowledge that he had amassed over a lifetime, and I absorbed it like a sponge. I’m so thankful to have met Jack and for being able to spend those years learning from him. I’m proud to offer a plant that will be the highlight of anyone’s rock garden named for a true legend. If you bought Penstemon barriettiae from me in the past, update your label!
Jack and one of the former Berry Garden directors looking over the alpine frame.
For Ronald Jackson “Jack” Poff, 1926-2011.