About Plant Select
Plant Select® is the country’s leading brand of plants designed to thrive in high plains and intermountain regions, offering plants that provide more beauty with less work so gardeners of all levels can achieve smart, stunning and successful gardens using fewer resources and with a more positive environmental impact.
Plant Select’s goal is to create smart plant choices for a new American landscape inspired by the Rocky Mountain region.
Why Plant Select was created
Gardening in the West can be challenging. We have extreme temperature changes, low and erratic precipitation, low humidity, alkaline soils, higher altitudes and howling winds. Plant Select was created to find, test, and distribute superior plants for our region.
Plant Select is a nonprofit collaboration of Colorado State University, Denver Botanic Gardens and professional horticulturists. Our mission is to seek out and distribute the very best plants for landscapes and gardens from the intermountain region to the high plains and beyond.
How we test and select plants
New plants come to the program from plant explorations, plant breeders, partners and passionate gardeners. Perennials, vines and grasses are tested for 3+ years at official trial sites and public gardens. Shrubs and trees are tested for 3-5 years at sites across Colorado and the region.
Plants for the program are considered for the following attributes:
- Flourish with less water
- Thrive in a broad range of conditions
- Tough and resilient in challenging climates
- Habitat-friendly
- Long-lasting beauty
- One of a kind/unusual
- Resist disease & insects
- Non-invasive
Many of the plants in the Plant Select program are native to the western United States, including Colorado and Utah. Some are native to North America. And some are native to parts of the world with similar climates and environments.
Please contact us at director@plantselect.org if you’re interested in becoming a licensed Plant Select® commercial grower or retail source.
