The Green Room: I discovered a great nursery

I don't do a lot of plant shopping at big-box garden centers although occasionally they're good for a surprise. More often than not, though, their selection is less than exciting, and sometimes their plants are not exactly healthy (see this recent post).

Last weekend I discovered that it doesn't have to be that way. For years I've been hearing rumors of the Home Depot in San Rafael, CA having a fantastic nursery. More than that, some Bay Area gardeners talk about it in almost reverent terms. In an old post from 2010, landscape designer Michelle Derviss raved:

I thank my lucky stars every time I shop at my local San Rafael Marin County CA Home Depot nursery. The nursery is on par with some of the best nurseries in United States. The guy who runs it, Charlie Rossi, is a seasoned horticultural veteran of the nursery industry. Your eyes would be blown out of their sockets if you walked into ‘his nursery’. Simply amazing.

More praised can be found in the comments to this blog post on Garden Rant.

Plants outside the store

Why is this Home Depot garden center so good when so many others plain suck? Easy: It has a dedicated nursery manager who prides himself on sourcing the best plants.

Last weekend I finally had the opportunity (or, rather, created the opportunity) to visit this fabled place. Did it live up to the hype?

Read on to find out.

The first thing I noticed was the amount of space dedicated to plants. In the photo above, you can see how many plants there are outside the store—more than most Home Depots have inside their garden centers!

The selection of succulents was quite decent. Nothing too exotic but that's not a surprise considering the big Southern California growers that provide most of the plants don't specialize in rarities. However, all the plants I saw seemed to be happy, healthy and better maintained than usual.

So much to look at!

Pedilanthus macrocarpus, not exactly mainstream in Northern California

Very nice agaves

Agave pygmae 'Dragon Toes'

Agave colorata 'Supreme', a choice selection

Agave attenuata 'Ray of Light' is not the kind of plant you'd expect to see at Home Depot

Something else I hadn't seen before: mixed sedums/sedeverias in one container. Usually it's one variety per container.

In addition, the plants were arranged with much more care and an eye towards what looks good. This is what I expect to see in a full-service nursery, not at a Home Depot.

Nice selection of shrubs and small trees:

Arbutus 'Marina'

Even grevilleas, including some I had never even heard of:

LEFT: Grevillea 'Bonnie Prince Charlie' RIGHT: Grevillea 'Dwarf Pink'

Eye-dazzling color against the muted gray of junipers and lavender—whoever arranged the plants knows what looks nice:

The outdoor area inside the actual garden center was both large and well-stocked:

It was wonderful seeing such a cornucopia of plants in what is the middle of winter (I know, it's hard to think of it as winter when temperatures are in the 70s):

Australian finger lime, not exactly box store material!

My local Home Depot nursery does NOT carry such a big selection of landscape-size shrubs and trees

In spite of the sheer number of plants for sale there were some empty tables left. I have to go back when they're stocked as well.

Acer palmatum 'Sango-kaku'

Acacia cognata 'Cousin Itt', anyone?

Bambusa multiplex 'Fernleaf'

Ceanothus thyrsiflorus 'El Dorado', not rare but oh so pretty

Nice and bushy Australian coast rosemary (Westringia fruticosa 'Wynyabbie Gem')

I didn't take a lot of photos inside the "real" garden center because it looked like most Home Depots. In essence, then, the San Rafael Home Depot has the same kind of garden center any Home Depot has PLUS a large outside area attached to the garden center PLUS plants upon plants outside the actual store.

Two colors of bougainvillea on one plant

Ornamental kale and cyclamen

Flats upon flats of groundcovers

Avocados!!

The house plant area wasn't large but it has a good selection:

And there were even more succulents:

Echeveria 'Colorshift'

For years I'd been looking for a reasonably priced Sansevieria trifasciata 'Bantel's Sensation'. Here they had half a dozen! (I didn't buy any because I already got one last year at Poot's Cactus Nursery.)

If I hadn't already bought so many plants on recent shopping sprees, I would have loaded up. Instead I limited myself to two plants: a small Sansevieria trifasciata 'Moonshine' (gray-green plants in the middle in the photo above), and a swoonworthy Grevillea 'Bonnie Prince Charlie' (a hybrid between Grevillea rosmarinifolia and Grevillea alpina):

My Grevillea 'Bonnie Prince Charlie'

One look at the flowers was all it took for me to know what I had to have this grevillea. It's already planted in the front yard. I don't waste time these days because I hate hand-watering plants in nursery containers.

Grevillea 'Bonnie Prince Charlie'

The nursery was busy when I was there on Saturday morning. From what I saw, it appears to be very popular with landscapers. I saw two guys leaving with four 15-gallon bamboos on a flat-bed cart. Heck, I've never seen a 15-gallon bamboo at any Home Depot before!

I don't know if Charlie Rossi is still the nursery manager. If he isn't, he has left a legacy that continues on—and is clearly successful. It doesn't take a finance degree to figure out that nicer plants and a bigger selection translates into more business. So why don't more Home Depot stores (or Lowe's, Orchard Supply, etc.) invest in their nurseries?

The San Rafael Home Depot is at 111 Shoreline Pkwy, San Rafael, CA 94901.