I first wrote about We-Du Nursery, Marion, NC over 2 years ago. Then last spring the rumor was that it had been sold. Gone for good? Some speculation on the whys and hows had been rolling around.
I’m happy to report the We-Du is now Meadowbrook Nursery and We-Du Natives. The new owners are Merri and Jamie Oxley. They previously ran a wholesale nursery near Hendersonville, NC. They did get most of the stock in the sale and are now in the process of locating, identifying and organizing what they do have. Meadowbrook Nursery/We-Du Natives will be open from 9 – 5 Wednesday through Saturday. They are retail only. That’s the good news. The not-so-good is that there will no longer be any mail order and there is no catalog. At the current time (10/7/02) there is an email address: wedu@wnclink.com. Jamie said the website is being constructed and should be available in a week or so. I don’t know how detailed the website will be as to plant offerings. The website will continue to be http://www.we-do.com/
For butterflies there is more good news. The nursery does still carry several plants that are good nectar and larval sources for butterflies. Four of us (3 CBS members, 1 prospective) plus 2 husbands (including John Turner, CBS president) and 2 mothers made up our group of 8. We search through the many plants and among us purchased aristolochia macrophylla, asclepias incarnata, lindera benzoin, liatris, helianthus, sedums for our gardens. There were other plants but I didn’t keep track of all of them.
Just as we were getting ready to leave, Jamie informed us that caterpillars were stripping all his passiflora, particularly in the “display” garden along the road. Well, it was stripped! But, CBS members to the rescue! We collected as many as we could and then were given a nice sized passiflora plant to feed them on the way home. I released about 15 of them in my garden. That was a nice bonus.
All in all, I will continue to visit Meadowbrook. If you live within a 3-4 hour driving range, it might be well worth a trip for you too. One note: at the present time, they do not accept credit cards. So bring your checkbook!
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