Greg Soles

Darwin Product Representative

Here are just a few of the favorite trial garden stops that the Darwin Perennials product teams visit each season. All in the pursuit of bringing the best plants to market!

C. Raker & Sons Trial Garden
Those of us looking to understand performance of new varieties have a plethora of sites where we can learn how varieties behave across the country. The Raker Trial Gardens in Michigan have always been a reliable, unbiased tool in my arsenal. Raker has multiple options for us perennial lovers: They have row trials, overwintering trials and commercial comparison trials. These trials open post-Cultivate every year and run through Labor Day. Annually they get around 3,000 industry visitors from all walks of horticulture.

C. Raker & Sons Trial Gardens 2016

Darwin Perennials’ Sunstruck Heliopsis planted 2015. Photographed July 2016.

New commercial comparison row trials at Raker planted 2016. Many new varieties of Coreopsis planted side by side.

Metrolina Trial Gardens
The Metrolina Trial Gardens are one of my routine stops throughout the summer. It offers open gardens as well as confidential gardens. Darwin Perennials trials in both venues at Metrolina. Metrolina works hard to continually improve retail plant settings. They invest heavily in market research to evaluate trends and seek growth opportunities.

The trial gardens at Metrolina.

It is great to see retail mock-ups using trial plant materials.

Coreopsis UpTick Yellow & Red at Metrolina. Planted April 2016, photographed August 18.

Costa Trial Gardens
Costa Farms promotes outside-the-box thinking by making all of us who are perennial breeders try to get hardy perennials into flower in January – in Miami! It is a challenge, but sometimes it creates stunning results. Costa Farms is where we learned that we can get the UpTick Coreopsis into flower without vernalization and without lights growing in the shortest days of the year!
Costa also invests in extensive perennial trialing at their Trenton, S.C., facility. These are not open to the public but all of us breeding perennials work closely with Costa to understand how our varieties perform in that region.

The Lowe's Season Premier, January 2016. Veronica Moody Blues Flowering in Miami in January.

Darwin Perennials' UpTick Gold & Bronze. Planted October 2015. Photographed in Miami in January 2016.

Penn State
A number of years ago, Penn State began including perennials in their trials. They have started to execute overwintering trials of many perennials. This independent trial is unbiased. Trials like this are executed across the country. We trial at many university trials: Ohio State, LSU, UGA, U of MN., UMASS and more.

Aris Green Leaf
These gardens are where I got my start in new product development. The Aris Green Leaf gardens are open to visitors – just call or check into the office. They offer in-ground Zone 6 performance trials from many different breeders.

Darwin Perennials' SuperBlue Lavender at Aris Trial Gardens: Planted 2015. Photo 6/16/16

North Creek Nurseries
North Creek Nursery invests heavily into trialing perennials from many different breeding companies. Their trials are open to the industry. They have the best trial of native grasses the industry can offer.
As we make the rounds to these various gardens around the country, we learn from all of these trials and our own Darwin Perennial trials how our varieties perform in the “4-Corners” of the country. There is a line in a Nickel Creek song: “...only the curious have something to find...”

Darwin Perennials' Salvia Blue Marvel 6/1/16 at North Creek Nurseries' trial gardens.