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Heritage Nursery

Our New Heritage Nursery

Dudley Farm Historic State Park's Unit Management Plan which was written in 2004 states the following:

"A heritage nursery is needed for propagation and maintenance of the heirloom variety of trees, shrubs and flowers from the Dudley landscape.  The long-range goal was that a plant nursery should be established outside the Dudley home place but within the park, to propagate samples of all garden plant materials and important tree varieties important to Dudley Farm."




With the vision of our CSO (Friends of Dudley Farm) president, Art Wade, this project began in earnest in Feb 2016. An area on the east side of park property near our Collections building was chosen for the site.  Brush and a few small trees had to be cleared. A tall 'deer proof' fence had to be put up as there are quite a few deer on the property. Then Art tapped a water line from a close-by well (one of the reasons for choosing this site) and ran hose bibs for the future irrigation system. Following this, Art laid rolls of landscape cloth for weed control. Then he invited our 2 resident volunteers Jimmy Stephens and Mike Crane to his own home nursery to learn how to construct raised tables for holding the plant pots. These volunteers did a marvelous job of constructing the three 40 ft long wood tables. Then Art installed the irrigation system which is on an automated timer system. 

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The "Soil Sisters"  have been busily potting up plants from stock growing in Dudley gardens and also from gardens of volunteers. Several large troughs have been set up with misting systems to propagate cuttings. Many plants and trees were donated, and  plants purchased at wholesale prices from Southern Gardening Nursery, Grandiflora Nursery, Chiappini Farm Native Nursery and and Micanopy Wildflowers. These plants will be a resource for maintaining stock for the Dudley homestead gardens, and will also be sold at the Commissary (gift shop) as a fundraiser for the Friends of Dudley Farm.

 A work table has been constructed by our wonderful resident volunteer. A new metal canopy to cover the worksite, and a storage cabinet to hold irrigation parts, fertilizer, etc has been purchased. We are well on our way to finally accomplishing this State Park goal which will be a great asset to Dudley Farm Historic State Park, and which is funded and built by the Friends of Dudley Farm.



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