Michael McConkey, owner of Edible Landscaping, selects a persimmon from among the many varieties he sells.
"Jujubes are just as much at home here as in China," McConkey says. He also offers a wide variety of native plants.
hen Ken Harnad, a professional chef who raises some of the food he uses, drives his tractor across his six-acre farm, he sees all around him the natural beauty of his trees and shrubs. He also sees something equally pleasing: ready-to-eat—and healthful—snacks. “When I’m mowing,” he says, “I reach from the tractor and pick.”
And why not, when your choices include quince, elderberry, apple, pear, walnut, currant, blueberry, gooseberry, Japanese persimmon, white cling peach, and eventually, fruit from his new mulberry tree? Harnad admits he’s planted so much that he’s forgotten what he has, so his wife may temporarily ban him from shopping at his favorite nursery: Edible Landscaping. But Harnad reaps what he has sown: a kitchen full of seasonal ripe fruits and vegetables—and nuts—to fuel his culinary creations.
Harnad is just one of many gardeners and growers who have turned to Edible Landscaping and its owner, Michael McConkey, for dual-purpose plantings: ornamental and edible. McConkey is an affable man with an innate passion for all things green and growing. After years of traveling, songwriting, gardening, and studying horticulture, McConkey set up his nursery in Afton, on the eastern slope of the Blue Ridge just west of Charlottesville.
McConkey’s inspiration? Meeting Dr. Elwyn Meader, a fruit breeder at the University of New Hampshire. “He grew just about everything,” McConkey says, “and he had a collection of rare plants,” including, it turns out, hardy kiwis—and that’s when McConkey’s story really begins. “He gave me cuttings of the kiwis, and I had 25 plants in my garden after I met him.” By January of the next year, a national gardening magazine published pictures of Meader with his hardy kiwis, telling readers he could buy some kiwi plants from Mike McConkey. “I got $14,000 worth of orders in a few weeks, and I had to get to work,” McConkey remembers.
Twenty years and about 100,000 customers later, McConkey runs his unique 25-acre nursery not far from the Blue Ridge Parkway. He’s cleared five of these acres and built on them eight greenhouses, surrounded with orchards. From this mountainous setting he sells about 26,000 plants annually to homeowners. (Large-scale farmers generally buy plants by the hundreds from wholesalers.) While the business may be the homeowner’s landscaping dream come true, McConkey does not actually offer a landscaping service. “Some ask us to landscape,” he says. Instead, “we often suggest names of landscapers.” And if one of his staff is looking for extra work, he may send that person along.
Unlike the traditional nurseryman, McConkey grows everything in pots — not in the ground. “Some plants really do better potted when they get started,” he says, noting that he and his staff do a lot of hands-on propagation. For locals, McConkey suggests looking to native plants first, but he also suggests many of the oriental fruits because the weather patterns here are so similar to Japan and parts of China. “They’ve cultivated fruits there for more than 1,000 years,” he says. “Jujubes are just as much at home here as in China.”
Not limited by its rural Virginia location, Edible Landscaping also serves “out-of-towners,” even out-of-staters. McConkey’s website offers a tempting catalog with full-color plant photos, which to the gardener must have the same high-impact appeal as an aromatic bakery does to the foodie. In armchair comfort without enduring Mother Nature’s climatic whims, wannabe gardeners can pick up some plant-care tips, scroll through his inventory list, and, with one click, both view the product and then place an order. For nonresidents, he typically mails the bareroot plants, though he does send potted plants by UPS.
