Recently I pulled up an old blog post from 2015; "Holiday cartoon déjà vu..."
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In that post I visited Marbott's, a local nursery with fabulous vintage greenhouses. The above and below photos are from that post.
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Hoping for a little holiday magic I stopped by Marbott's last week. It was late enough in the season I was pretty sure their poinsettia would all be gone, and I was right. No worries, wandering through their greenhouses is always a heart-warming experience. Except no. There were signs on a couple of the doors saying the growing greenhouses were closed. Bummer. I explored the rest of the nursery though, buying a few things and appreciating their gift suggestions...![]()
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Are you still with me? This has been a very long and rambling post. What I'd planned to share as a throw-back to a happy holiday memory has morphed to a sad story of entitled people. Here's what I hope you take away from all this: gardeners are the best people, true plant lovers share their knowledge and their plants. Be one of those people.
Back then I'd happened to stop by the nursery when one of their greenhouses was filled with poinsettias—just like that I was magically taken back to this scene from the 1969 Rankin/Bass holiday special, Frosty the Snowman. I was so inspired that I wrote about it.
Checking out (paying for my purchases) I mentioned that I'd hoped to wander thru the greenhouses and was sad to see them closed. Well what do you know, I was then invited to do so, score! ![]()
Of course we started talking about why the the greenhouses were closed. Dammit. Theft. People pinching pieces of the plants. It's a widespread problem, and not just here but at nurseries around town, like Tony's. Where it wasn't just "pinching" that happened...![]()
From things I've heard, it sounds like a lot of these issues have to deal with the trendy houseplant collectors. I've always said that gardeners are good people... and included houseplant enthusiasts in that statement, but issues like this make me wonder. There was a recent article that made the rounds in Facebook groups I'm a part of; "The online plant community has a hoarding problem"![]()
It's an interesting story. On one hand I think plants=good, on the other hand the insane mark-up that's occurring on (mainly) houseplants—and fueling the theft?—is criminal. My friend Evan wrote a nice rebuttal to that article on Instagram (here).![]()
Referring to the story I linked to above, he writes: "The generosity of gardeners always amazes me. I received several cuttings in the mail the other day from fellow plant lovers and it made me so happy…
Of course we started talking about why the the greenhouses were closed. Dammit. Theft. People pinching pieces of the plants. It's a widespread problem, and not just here but at nurseries around town, like Tony's. Where it wasn't just "pinching" that happened...
I debated about posting this, as it's not very glamorous or even a very good shot, but then I read an article interviewing several Instagram "plantfluencers" (ew) and there were a lot of comments about how expensive gardening is, with all the equipment and guides you have to buy (with supposed frequency), and how isolating gardening is. What? You're doing it wrong. You can grow plants in plastic cups for f*cks sake. Gardening doesn't take a lot of equipment if you select plants that will grow in your conditions, including indoors. I have tons of plants selected to grow well in the natural light of my windows, no artificial lights or indoor grow tents required. I do have lights, since I ran out of window space, but it's very easy to garden without going into debt. Stop buying "rare" plants that aren't even rare for grossly inflated prices. New plant on the market? Wait a few years and you'll find it for a fraction of the cost. Grow plants that you like and that grow well for you, not for online clout.
Lonely? Join a plant society! Or a neighborhood garden group. This is also a great way to get free or cheap plants, pots, tools, even lights and other equipment. And you'll make new friends who can teach you based on actual experience, or point you to verified information, instead of learning from fake "plantfluencers" or useless, generic puff articles online.
Start small. Learn as you grow. You will kill plants. We all have. Don't start with the expensive ones. Grow what you love, not what will give you the most likes."
So well said! That same day that I visited Marbott's and heard of their theft issues, a box of aeonium cuttings showed up on my backdoor step. A friend in San Diego mentioned on Facebook that his aeoniums were so prolific he'd started just throwing out cuttings. I said "don't throw them out, send them to me!" and so he did...![]()
Over two dozen stems!
Are you still with me? This has been a very long and rambling post. What I'd planned to share as a throw-back to a happy holiday memory has morphed to a sad story of entitled people. Here's what I hope you take away from all this: gardeners are the best people, true plant lovers share their knowledge and their plants. Be one of those people.
I hope that you are having a wonderful holiday season.
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