Hope springs Eternal. I'm not sure where that saying came from and looking outside, spring looks pretty far away. But the holidays are over, 2026 has begun and spring is less than three months away. 

The 2026 seeds are in, if you are an early planner, but seed starting season doesn't start for another month or two at least. You have probably already received seed catalogs and plant catalogs in the mail or as pop-up ads on the internet. These days you'll probably also receive pop-ups for flower bulbs, fruit trees, berry bushes and perennials as well as the traditional flower and garden seeds. Buying seeds from a catalog used to be easy. Pick what you want, send in the order with a check and get your seeds. These days it seems everything is done on the internet with PayPal, Venmo or some other type of electronic payment system and then there are the scams. Frankly, it's just a little too much for me. 

Electronics aside, when ordering from anywhere, where you are buying a product without seeing it first, always check the fine print. What happens when that beautiful apple tree you just purchased comes in a small mailing tube because it is only eighteen inches tall with almost no roots? Do you really want to wait ten to fifteen years to see your first apple? Paper and online catalogs always show you what the plant will look like, but they will never tell you how long it will take to get that way. If they did, they would never sell anything. So, know what you are paying for before you buy it. 

When we order items for the garden center, our growers have a menu of sorts of different plant sizes and prices. Fruit trees typically come in four-to-five foot, five-to-six foot or six-to-seven foot categories and are priced accordingly. Online catalogs will also have sizing listed, but it is usually in the fine print, so look for it. If you order a tree that is supposed to be four feet tall and it comes in only being eighteen inches, you have a case for a refund. Bottom line is that you don't want to wait a decade for any plant to look the way you want it to look. Case in point, every fall we pack away all our remaining trees and shrubs to overwinter them for the following spring. 

Every spring when we unpack them, there are always a few plants that don't look so good and will not make it back into the garden center. Well back in 2023, when we moved from Swan Lake to Eldred, suddenly I had a new yard to landscape, and I brought home some of those “not ready for primetime” plants. Well, the deer ate half of them the week I planted them before I could even get a deer fence up. The other half are still alive but are taking so long to even recover, that I am thinking of replacing them with full size shrubs this coming spring. I have been giving them plenty of TLC, but it just takes so long for the plants to recover even with the greatest of care. Meanwhile a couple new plants that I put in last spring were already thriving this season and hopefully will be again this spring. 

So as these cold, snowy winter days get you longing for spring, don't get duped by slick catalogs or flashy online sites looking to sell you the newest, greatest plants. Spring will get here and once again the garden center will be full of beautiful trees and shrubs that you can see and touch before you buy.