Q. Comparing the Information On Different Plant Tags
Hello what are the factors that contribute to different nurseries providing different information ie: mature height and width on any given plant? For example take Thuja green giant and one nursery will say it will grow to mature width of 5 to 10 feet while another nursery will say it will grow to 20 feet or more in width. Why is there such a dramatic difference when the plant being talked about is the same and the plants are being sold in the same plant hardiness zone. Thank you.
A.
Always take the information printed on plant tags as guidelines, not hard and fast rules. Plants have different growth habits and tendencies in different climates. For example, a plant from California, will grow completely differently than it would in Prince George, even if it were to be hardy enough! We may not know exactly how a plant grows here if the tag was printed somewhere else, until someone physically grows it here and has a couple of years experience with it. With the quantity of new varieties being released, some plants don't even make it a couple of years before something newer replaces them.
You also have to look the information on tags closely. For example, most US sourced plants use USDA hardiness information. This is different than the Canadian / British hardiness system. For tags we print ourselves, we try and give real-world information and well as time-limited information. For example, when we print height and width on a tag, we tend to use a 10 year growth rate, not a mature growth rate.
In summary, use the plant tags as guidelines and suggestions, not rules
Posted: 12/12/2017 12:00:00 AM
Author: Mike
Location: Surrey, British Columbia, Canada
Tags: plant tags, growing information, comparing plant information