This is part of our continuing coverage of the Farwest Show. Keep checking back for updates. This post concerns Day Two of the Farwest Show Tours, specifically, Tour 3, the New Plants tour on Wednesday, August 22, 2012.

Our first stop this morning was at the Stark Street location of Portland Nursery, which is one of the leading retail nurseries in the state of Oregon. With roots going back to 1907, this operation has been around for a long time. Originally a retail and wholesale operation, it changed over to strictly retail several years ago under the leadership of owner Jon Denney. The operation employs 50 people, many of whom have been with the nursery a long time.

Tour stop host Suzy Hancock of Portland Nursery highlighted what an advantage it is to be a retail nursery located in the state of Oregon. “We are very blessed in the Willamette Valley,” she said. “We have some of the best growers around. We get new things first, a lot of the time.”

The nursery benefits from a close relationship with several wholesale growers, she said. These include Monrovia Growers, which has a large growing operation an hour away in Dayton, Ore.; Log House Plants, an innovative grower of vegetables that has pioneered the return of heirloom vegetables; Skagit Gardens, which unleashes a new torrent of perennial and annual introductions each year; Rare Plant Research, which under owner Burl Mostul has popularized the hardy banana and many other unique plants; and Terra Nova Nurseries, the breeding house known for its Heucheras and many other introductions.

We’ll have pictures tonight at the Farwest Show Facebook page