In Pictures: Plant propagator gathers seeds from the wilds of Alberta
Arden Nering's nursery sells native plants, which are better suited to survival
Troy and Arden Nering run Wild About Flowers, an Alberta nursery near Calgary. Ms. Nering spends the warmer seasons picking flower and grass seeds, often exotic varieties, from the wilds of the Alberta foothills.Chris Bolin/The Globe and Mail
Wild About Flowers, which also does mail order, is part of a movement among nurseries specializing in indigenous plants, which are heartier and more suited to growing conditions in Alberta.Chris Bolin/The Globe and Mail
Unlike imported species, these plants rarely need fertilizers or extra watering. The trend is meant to counter the destruction of native habitats.
From her rustic acreage, which lies 35 minutes southwest of Calgary, the Nerings sell seeds and seed mixes, as well as flower and grass plugs (seen above) that they grow themselves.
“We go out into natural spaces, backcountry roads, Crown land, private property by invitation, and we collect seed from these natural spaces,” Ms. Nering said. “We’ve got quite a selection now of different species because there’s so many to choose from. The idea is that these are really hearty landscape plants in a harsh environment,” she said.Chris Bolin/The Globe and Mail
The saline shooting star, one of the wildflowers carried by Wild About Flowers.
This is Wild About Flowers’s booth at the Millarville Farmers Market in Millarville, Alta.
What keeps this kind of business small, however, is that picking and cultivating wildflower seeds and grasses is highly time-consuming.
Here is the sales yard at Wild About Flowers. Despite her business’s small size, Ms. Nering serves a variety of customers. “We’ve sold to municipalities. We sell to the City of Calgary, the City of Edmonton. We sell to architects for green roofs,” she says. “We sell to landscapers for big acreage projects or city lots.”
Ms. Nering prepares seeding beds for the winter on the 10-acre property.Chris Bolin/The Globe and Mail
Pictured is scorpion weed, with a bumblebee visitor. The business sells more than 100 species of wildflowers.
The challenge for Ms. Nering is how to expand her nursery enough so that she can propagate more wildflowers and grasses herself. She would then spend less time searching the wilds, and she would be able to reduce her prices.
The risk, however, is that expanding the business may take it into a less specialized direction or make it more of a retail operation like other nurseries. “We do a lot of plant hunting. That’s the most fun, but that’s not probably the bread and butter, right?”