New, uncommonly simple and unusual are mainstays at Buena Creek Gardens, a nursery that has succeeded by doing it’s own thing and doing it with a personal touch. The gardens has one of its signature sales events 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday to Sunday with all plants 20 percent off regular prices.
“It’s gotten a lot busier around here,” said Steve Bingham who owns the four acre nursery with wife Donna and has one employee. “But, it’s still as unique as ever. We grow what others don’t or can’t We grow everything you can’t find at Home Depot. And you can always find a horticulturist on the property.”
Bingham is an Atherton native and UC Santa Cruz graduate. He worked at Quail Botanical Gardens in Encinitas and was a founder of the San Diego Horticultural Society. He wrote “Trees of San Diego,” the society’s initial book offering. Bingham hired on in 1988 to manage a property popularly known as “The Farm” in the Twin Oaks Valley and its mail order business.
Otherwise known as Cordon Bleu Farms, Bob Brooks and partner Ray Chesnik grew iris and hybrid day lilies starting in the 1970s at a site that was homesteaded in 1896 and later owned by a college art teacher. Brooks retired in 1996 and sold the property that is located about 40 miles north of downtown San Diego to Bingham.
Bingham later met Donna, married in 2000 and created the ultimate mom-and-pop nursery. The Binghams live on site. They branched out dramatically from the signature day lilies, surrounding themselves with several gardens in which the mother plants are cultivated in the open for public display with their progeny on sale.
Variety adds spice to the gardens. More than 5,000 varieties of flowers are grown from seeds and cuttings, with some rotating during the growing year due to space limitations. At any given time, about 1,100 varieties are on display and available for purchase.
Newly installed walkways glide by a sun perennial garden, followed by a shade garden, a drought tolerant garden, native landscaping garden, sales displays with separate selections of iris, bulbs, roses, salvias, trees, vines and the latest addition – a groundbreaking and spectacular bird and butterfly garden.
During the age of day lilies in the 1990s, the gardens had 12 employees and $370,000 in annual sales that included a large mail-order business. These days, annual sales have been stable, averaging around $130,000 a year. This works well with the Bingham’s lifestyle and hands-on growing methods that needs only one other employee.
Donna Bingham specializes un the retail end of the business although she also does a lot of growing and is well-schooled on all aspects of horticulture.
“I do the displays,” Donna Bingham said. “We share propagation. Everybody who comes in gets John or me. Working together has been fabulous, We would never do it any other way, We get along and always have something to talk about.”
Ron Stevens, an Escondido energy consultant, has been coming to the gardens since the mid-1980's and helps as a volunteer at sales events,
“The sales events are like mini-festivals,” Stevens said. “Everyone who is interested in unusual plants all show up and it’s a madhouse for a while. You see people you haven’t seen since the last plant sale.
Buena Creek Gardens is located at 408 Buena Creek Road in San Marcos. It is open to the public 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily. The phone number is 760-744-2810. An extensive Web site is at
http://www.buenacreekgardens.com.
