Seven plantings worked out for one spot or one purpose: a wet corner, a dry bank, shade under big trees, a hedge for birds, a native orchard, a honey flow and rare oaks. Add the plants you want individually, or ask us to put the whole set together at the sizes on hand.
For bees: two months of nectar on a big lot
Three of the finest nectar trees in eastern North America. Black locust and basswood give the lightest, most sought-after honeys, and black gum flowers between them and colors scarlet in fall.
For the shade under tall trees
Five plants that are happiest under a canopy of oaks: flowers from March to November, fruit for thrushes, and the host plants of two swallowtails.
For the corner that floods each spring
For the corner where the lawn drowns every spring. Every plant here tolerates standing water, and together they give fragrance, winter berries and year-round structure.
For a dry, sandy bank in full sun
Pine-barrens and prairie toughness for sand, gravel and drought: two shrub oaks, two fruit plants, prairie leadplant and the best fall color on a dry bank.
For fruit and nuts without sprays
A food forest from native species only: fruit from August into November and nuts in the fall, grown without sprays and shared with wildlife.
For birds: fruit from June to March
A mixed native hedge that fruits from June through the following March, with dense cover for nesting and thorns at the edges.
For collectors with room, zones 7 to 8
Five oaks almost nobody grows, from six-foot shrub oaks to an eighty-foot bottomland giant. A living collection for a large property or a conservation planting.