The RHS Plant Finder and RHS Plant Selector combined into a single Find a Plant service, searching over 250.000 plant records. RHS Find a Plant is the standard bearer of the plant source genre published by the Royal Horticultural Society in Britain. Considered an authority for nomenclature, the Plant Finder also relates additional information such as if a plant won an award, has doubled flowers or which classification the plant belongs to within its type (e.g. a damask rose is designated with a “D”). Also available in print, this resource is useful simply for its reference value, even if you don’t plan to start importing plants.
Archives: Recommended Websites
King Conservation District Native Plant Publications
A four page list of nurseries and other sources for Northwest native plants.
findmyroses.com
This site will help you locate that rose, peonies and clematis you’re looking for. They have information for over 45,000 varieties and species, many with sources.
PlantScout
Dave’s Garden’s PlantScout searches listings from 77 vendors (as of July 2018). Searching for a plant will generate a list of linked nurseries that report selling it. From the results page, the plant name link goes to the Plant Files database; “purchase” goes to the nursery’s web site; while the nursery name link goes to a list of all the plants offered by that nursery. The nursery inventory page has a link to the Garden Watchdog customer review page for that nursery. Vendors pay a yearly fee to include their inventory in the database, but it is free to visitors.
Garden Watchdog Guide to Gardening by Mail
Dave’s Garden is a long time gardening community site with forums, a plant description database and other features, much of it for free. Garden Watchdog harnesses one of the more potent Internet developments: the customer opinion. Plant hunters should search the Watchdog database for over 86,000 customer ratings of 4,000+ vendors and nurseries before buying.
King County DNR: Native Plant Nurseries for the Pacific Northwest
This listing of retail and wholesale nurseries and stores was compiled by the Water and Land Resources Division of King County, Washington for your convenience. The list draws in part on the Hortus West Native Plant Directory and the journal Hortus West.
Native Seed Network
For serious eco-restorationists, the origin of the native plant seed is critical. The Native Seed Network is a service offered by the non-profit Institute for Applied Ecology and the Bureau of Land Management to help people find sources for plant material from specific eco-regions.
National Suppliers Directory
Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center’s database of nurseries that sell native plants.
FindNurseries.com
FindNurseries.com offers a National Directory of Nurseries and related businesses organized by state. The individual listing are very basic, consisting of only the nursery name, address and phone number. Although the search options claim a search can be made of general plant types, in fact this kind of searching doesn’t work well. However, searching for a city or zip code does work.