Me-Wuk Nursery has native plants for sale
Sugar Pine Realty-Better Homes & Gardens has four offices throughout Tuolumne County to help homeowners market their property, and is the only real estate office in the county authorized to use the Better Homes & Gardens name."Better Homes & Gardens is a great name for us," said owner Emmett Brennan, "because it typifies what we do. We represent the home and family."
Emmett started Sugar Pine Realty in a small building in Sugar Pine in 1977. The company franchised with Better Homes & Gardens in 1985.
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The greenhouse at the Tuolumne Me-Wuk Native Plant Nursery is thriving with life and many of those plants will be on display and on sale at this year's Home and Garden Show.
The nursery, on the Tuolumne Rancheria off Tuolumne Road North, about a mile north of the town, has been open since April 1995.
Construction on the greenhouse, equipment shed and office was started in January 1994 thanks to a $200,000 grant from the Administration for Native Americans. The nursery was the first project of the Tuolumne Me-Muk Tribal Council's business development office.
The nursery offers a selection of native Tuolumne County and California plants, which do well in the foothills.
California Buckeye, several types of Manzanita, wildflowers, bushes and grasses are raised by Nursery Manager Dave Lingo with the help of volunteer Lawrence Wilson.
"My boss is the whole tribe," said Lingo. "They see the progress every day as they drive by, and I think they are happy."
The nursery had help from the Cornfield Nursery in Elk Grove and Shelterwood and Solomon nurseries in Tuolumne County when it started. Now, the nursery produces a majority of its plants through seeding and propagation.
Lingo also hopes to offer packaged seed in the future, but those would be sold in limited quantities.
It will take a few more years to develop the nursery into a full-scale wholesale and retail business, but it has a lot to offer now to any landscaper or home gardener interested in attractive, hardy plants.
In addition to the native species, the nursery has some non-native plants that have traditionally been grown in the Mother Lode.
The nursery is open Wednesday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.
At the Home and Garden Show, prize drawings for $20 gift certificates will be held four times each a day.
Tuolumne Me-Wuk Native Plant Nursery
19600 Mi-Wu St., Tuolumne Rancheria
928-3793