Re: [SG] CAT: Park Seed, Arrowhead Alpines
- To: s*@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
- Subject: Re: [SG] CAT: Park Seed, Arrowhead Alpines
- From: B* S* <B*@HSC.EDU>
- Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1999 07:52:57 -0400
>My experience is that the seeds are fine but that the plants are very small.
>I've never figured out what Park Seed's connection to Wayside is. The
>catalogs have the same type face, same pictures, same home town, but Park
>Seed tends to be a little cheaper. Someone in a chat group once said they
>were both connected to an extreme right-wing organization, but didn't offer
>any proof.
Wayside was founded and run for many years in Ohio (Mentor, I think it
was), then was purchased by Park Seeds Co. and moved to South Carolina.
Wayside has always been a fairly expensive source and on the few occasions
I have bought from them, I found nothing special about their plants. Now I
search for plants pictured in their expensive color catalog elsewhere--for
example, the current catalog features Dichorisandra (Blue Ginger), but you
can find it in specialist nurseries (like Shephard's Tropicals) for half
the Wayside price. I would not expect the Wayside plant to be any better
for the money, based on past experience.
The two catalogs (Wayside and Parks) may find different audiences--the
Wayside catalog aimed more at the hoity-toity White Flower Farm crowd,
folks with plenty of money and a susceptibility to fine catalog prose (Amos
Pettingill, indeed--who do they think they're fooling?). Parks is
definitely middle-class, strikes me as going for the dedicated,
dirt-under-the-fingernails, backyard vegetable gardener. Thus the
differences in price in some items they have in common. But all are from
the same ultimate source.
Park Seed has been my main source for vegetable and annual flower seeds for
many years. I find them to be very reliable. The seed comes in foil
packets which preserve freshness better than plain paper packets. My only
gripe is that about 10 years ago they drastically cut the number of
offerings of rarer seeds in their catalog. I believe they are the second
or third largest seed retailer in the country, in the same class as
Burpee's (and what a name that is!).
The Arrowhead Alpines plant catalog arrived yesterday, listing a large
number of iris species. I've tried a few and the plants are of good size
and shape. But speaking of catalog prose--this has got to be the most
irritating catalog going.
Bill Shear
Department of Biology
Hampden-Sydney College
Hampden-Sydney VA 23943
(804)223-6172
FAX (804)223-6374
email<bills@hsc.edu>
