Catskill Native Nursery

The above links take you to lists of the plants we carry along with info on whether or not the plant is a Catskill Mountain native, a rough idea of the distribution of the plant (for detailed maps check out the Natural Resources Conservation Services’ PLANTS database, or NatureServe’s Explorer database, and current availability. Under the heading ‘Catskill Native?’ if we indicate ‘Lowlands’ it means the plant is native to Ulster County but is restricted to lower elevations such as the Hudson Valley and doesn’t occur (to the best of our knowledge) in the Catskills. At the present time we do not ship plants, although occasionally we are able to handle small orders. Please contact us if you have found a plant we carry that you would like to purchase and simply are too far away to pay us a visit.

Under the “Availabile?” heading, “Yes” obviously means we have the plant available for sale; “No” obviously means we don’t at the present time - but we may in the future; “Limited” means we have the plant but in limited quantities (generally less than 6); a month, such as “June” means we will have the plant available at that time; “Catskill” means we have the plant available and it has a Catskill Mountain provenance; “Stock” means we are in possession of parental plants, are using them as a source for seeds, divisions or cuttings, and will have the plant available in the future; “Seedlings” means that we have flats of seedling but have yet to pot them up for sale. They should be available as mature plants in pots in the near future.

Provenance refers to the geographic origin of the seed or stock used in propagation. When plants are propagated from local regional sources it ensures that they are adapted to the environmental conditions of the region in which you garden and, from the point of view of conservation, helps to maintain genetic diversity within species and preserve regionally unique genotypes.

Our goal is to grow as large a percentage of Catskill natives from Catskill stock as we can but the process takes time. Seeds of many woodlanders, for example, must spend two winters outside before they germinate. Another few years of growing must pass before the plant reaches flowering size.

We carry a wide variety of plants, but few in large numbers at present. If you are a landscaper, landscape architect, or a home gardener with a big garden or big plans please contact us for current number of plants available. We can usually grow larger numbers of any particular plant, but, obviously, need lead time to do so. And if a plant you desire is not listed here please contact us - we can usually obtain seed or other propagating stock.