New videos feature 2024 top performing plants from Michigan trial gardens

Heidi Lindberg<wollaege@msu.edu>, Michigan State University Extension - January 07, 2025

Growers can view a new series of videos that feature top varieties from the 2024 Michigan Garden Plant Tour.

Several flower baskets hang from poles. — Photo by Heidi Lindberg, MSU Extension

Every year the leading young plant producers and the trial gardens at Michigan State University (MSU) showcase new plant selections, recent favorites, and their garden performance during the Michigan Garden Plant Tour. The tour provides growers the chance to evaluate plant varieties in different settings at multiple locations. During the season, Michigan State University Extension picks their favorite varieties at each trial garden, which are highlighted in the “Featured Four Favorites” article series.

After the season, each trial manager evaluates their own plant cultivars and makes their own favorite selections, which they share at the Michigan Greenhouse Growers Expo in December of each year. At the 2024 Expo, Michigan Plant Growers Co-op sponsored this “Best of the Best 2024” session and it was recorded for those who may have missed it.

Growers who are interested in the top selections from each trial garden can now view the videos “Best Performing Annuals and Perennials in Michigan” series from each trial garden:

For more information on each location’s trial gardens and their plant catalogs, please check out each young plant producer’s website. Three locations of those involved in the Michigan Garden Plant Tour provide much more information on their trial gardens on their websites. Mast Young Plants publishes their “2024 Trial Garden Results and Data,” which features the trial garden results, consumer favorites, top combinations and featured trials of the year. Raker-Roberta’s Trial Gardens summarizes their best performing plants and has a searchable trial website by trial year, genus and breeder. MSU posts their trial results on their website as an excel file, which includes plant name, breeder, vigor, uniformity, “wow” factor and resistance to stress ratings for different evaluation dates throughout the season.

Growers should save the date for the 2025 Michigan Garden Plant Tour: July 28 to Aug. 8. We hope to see you there!

To read the MSU Extension Featured Four article series, check them out here:

This article was published by Michigan State University Extension. For more information, visit https://extension.msu.edu. To have a digest of information delivered straight to your email inbox, visit https://extension.msu.edu/newsletters. To contact an expert in your area, visit https://extension.msu.edu/experts, or call 888-MSUE4MI (888-678-3464).