In famously fertile Canby, Oregon — surrounded by growers in every direction — a grove of oak trees shelters Colony Nursery. Clinton Smay wakes up, peeks out the window to see what kind of a day is shaping up for the plants. Smay lives right in the middle of the grounds with his wife Kyra and their three children and co-owns the nursery with Travis Burke.

The couple’s 7-year-old son Carter takes his role seriously as the official customer greeter. Once during a tour, when Smay’s van got caught in the mud, Carter finished the tour solo, earning a $10 tip.

“We have unobstructed views to Mt. Hood which is super sweet, and I get to see the sunrise from my window when I get out of bed in the morning,” said Smay.

You can’t beat the commute, but living where you work means your career and home lives are knitted like a graft join.

“Sunup to sundown, we’re out there checking our plants.”

Years of tradition

The nursery — started by brothers Bill, Bob, and Dan Knopp — has been a fixture in the Willamette Valley since 1968, with a focus on conifers, evergreen and deciduous shrubs, broadleaf evergreens and bamboo. All the material is sold as either B&B or container.

Smay says twin brothers Bill and Bob learned about conifer propagation when they were young while working at John Mitsch’s nursery. Smay said the brothers started building their collection while their father grew some strawberries, “and it’s 60 years later and we still use the same propagation methods to produce 95% of our stock in-house from cutting and grafts, buying the balance from friends in the [Willamette] Valley.”

Longtime employees Burke and Smay took over the nursery in 2020. Burke’s wife, Kayla, is Dan Knopp’s daughter. Officially, Burke is the secretary, and Smay the president — so Burke likes to call him “President Clinton.”

Burke was ready for a change from the tire industry when he joined Colony as a general laborer in 2006 and began working his way up the ranks.

“I came to the nursery and never left,” he said. Courses in propagation, plant identification and Spanish rounded out his on-the-job training. Burke had known Smay since high school in Canby. Smay, who said he’s “been growing plants since he was 18,” had is own 10-acre nursery and worked at Wilbur-Ellis after college.

Whiplash weather

The new partnership faced a rollercoaster of challenges right from the start.

First the pandemic almost shut them down, with countless shipping orders on dug plants cancelled. “I remember both of us having tears in our eyes, saying, ‘Well, that was a great run,’ ” said Burke. Of course, the situation reversed quickly once agriculture was allowed to stay open. “I don’t think we stopped shipping the whole year after that.”

Then the Santiam Fire swept through from August–December 2020.

“During those fires we had a bunch of bareroot plants to get in,” Smay said.

“I just pleaded with my guys to please come in. We were out at eight in the morning planting with our faces covered and it was black as midnight. It was like something you’d never seen.”

The ice storm of February 2021 was next. “It was apocalyptic,” said Smay. “We were without power for 11 days. There were power lines down across all the entrances. He estimated the two weeks of cleanup with a crew of 20 and the broken roof repairs cost about $50,000 after owning the nursery a year.

After all of that, “we joke that we’d like to see some ‘precedented years,’ ” Burke said.

Business today

The wholesale nursery comprises about 200 acres, on a mix of owned and leased land. When the pair started, most of the customers were on the East Coast, so they’ve worked to diversify by adding outlets in the Midwest and West Coast.

“When we took over, we did zero dollars in the Pacific Northwest and California, and now the West is a piece of the puzzle,” Smay said.

The company sells to brokers, garden centers and landscapers — but not to big box stores. “I don’t think it’s good for IGC’s [independent garden centers],” said Burke, “and they’re our bread-and-butter.”

 “Since Clinton and I took over, on the same land we’ve probably grown sales 40–50%.” He puts that down to using space more efficiently, “trying some new things and listening to customers to offer a better mix of things that sell a little better.”

Boxwood, in myriad sizes and forms, from cones and balls to spirals and obelisks, is a long-standing top-seller.

“People freak out about boxwood blight, but with good cultural and weather conditions you can still grow a good crop,” said Smay.

Colony focuses on growing larger-sized plants for the landscape and re-wholesale markets, Smay said.

“The quick flip is not our game. We do tried-and-true proven varieties, and we’ll let other people experiment and we’ll run with the good stuff. It’s not a get-rich-quick scheme but there’s always going to be a demand for big, nice plants.”

Smay said they focus on quality over quantity. “We’ll let the plants speak for themselves. We don’t want to ship out anything we wouldn’t put in our own yard. We say to our workers, ‘If you wouldn’t put it in the boss’ yard, why would you put it on the truck?”

Judging from customer feedback on Google, the focus on quality is being noticed. At the same time, the pair can’t resist a few outliers. “Clinton and I we like little weirdo plants,” said Burke. “We will trial pretty much anything that makes sense for our lineup, and that’s worked out well. They added Itoh peonies, which can be fussy and expensive to grow, and are trialing larger size rose of Sharon (Hibiscus syriacus hybrids).

The star of the lineup is Colony’s exclusive ‘Skinny Skip® cherry laurel (Prunus laurocerasus ‘Skinny Skip’). “We introduced the plant to market and partnered with Woodburn Nursery & Azaleas to make sure we have good availability,” Smay said. “We have licensed Jason Karam with C&J Nursery to sell liners to other interested growers and he should have availability Spring/Summer 2025.” 

‘Skinny Skip’ is an extra-narrow cherry laurel that maxes out at three feet wide, making it perfect for tight spaces and urban gardens. It’s a darker green than the typical form and a half-zone hardier, Burke said.

‘Skinny Skip’ took home a Retailer’s Choice Award at the pair’s debut appearance at the Farwest show this year.

Burke sees this fitting in with the high demand for columnar plants, including junipers and ‘Dee Runk’ boxwood, noting, “anything skinny and narrow has been very popular.”

The nursery has about 15–25 employees that shifts seasonally, but Burke said, “We try to give our employees the opportunity to work year-round, and we buy them lunch and dinner as much as possible.”

Smay points out they have a very low turnover rate. Several of the staff have been there for decades. His “number one guy” started about the time he was born, 39 years ago. “It’s kind of humbling to be their boss,” he said.

For Burke, the relationships with the staff at the nursery and the industry are the best part of his new life. “It’s the people at my nursery. I’ve become very close with a lot of our guys.  I also want to say how friendly and willing to help other wholesale nurseries are. You can pick the biggest nursery you can think of, and the owner will sit down with you to answer questions and maybe give you a tour.”

What’s next?

Focused for decades on B&B plants, Colony is trialing a new pot-in-pot field. Burke said it can avoid some of the frost-related crop loss and root disturbance you see with B&B, and you can harvest in the summer.

He said they are also eyeing more mechanization. “We have a couple of digging machines which is helpful as our digging crew ages, and a potting line now, which has been a lot of fun.”

 “Our hope is to invest in some more equipment to let them work with us as long as possible,” Smay said, even if an excavator may cost $100,000 – which means, “you gotta sell a lot of shrubbery.” 

When asked about Colony’s vision for the next decade, Smay said “I’m not interested in 10 years — I’m interested in 50. It takes too long to grow these plants. I just planted a bunch of spruces that I won’t harvest until my kids are out of college. In 50 years, I see Colony being owned by the Burke and Smay families, still putting out top-quality specimen material. Just being outside, growing plants and taking care of people is what we want to be doing.”

• Founded: 1968
• Owners: Clinton Smay and Travis Burke
• Known for: Conifers, evergreen and deciduous shrubs, broadleaf evergreens and bamboo
• Contact: 28889 S. Needy Road, Canby, Oregon 97013, 503-651-2348
• Online: ColonyNursery.com

From the December 2024 issue of Digger magazine | Download PDF of article