Oldtown
Local news covering the Oldtown area
Oldtown Resident Profile: Jimmy Rogers Grows a Community
Talk to any native plant enthusiast in Laurel, and he or she probably will have met, read, or worked with Jimmy Rogers. Although Rogers is fairly new to Laurel, having moved here in 2020, he quickly made a name for himself in the gardening community.
Growing up, Rogers helped his mother spread mulch in her large garden, but he wasn’t drawn to gardening until he became a homeowner himself. Upon purchasing a home in Laurel, he used apps to identify the plants on his new property. He quickly discovered that almost nothing growing in his yard was native to Maryland. Around the same time, Brian Coyle, one of the founders of Laurel for the Patuxent, recommended that Rogers read Doug Tallamy’s book Bringing Nature Home. That book is a major catalyst for the current trend of using native plants to support insects and restore some of the biodiversity lost to lawn-centric landscaping. Inspired by Tallamy’s work, Rogers began adding native plants to his yard. Eventually, he used woodchips from an arborist to cover all the grass in his yard and replaced it with roughly 150 species of native plants.
Beyond working in his own garden, Rogers spent a significant amount of time volunteering in Laurel to help others create their own native plantings. He also volunteered with other eco-minded organizations in the larger community. Rogers eventually realized he could not sustain both an intense volunteer schedule and his full-time job as a contractor and project manager for the Food and Drug Administration. In April 2024, Rogers began the process of officially registering his own business, Vibrant Gardening, a company focused on designing gardens and providing consultations for native plant enthusiasts. In 2027, he will reduce his FDA work to four days a week, as Vibrant Gardening is now profitable enough to replace a fifth of his primary salary.
Rogers is primarily self-taught and jokes that he made all the mistakes in his own garden so that his clients don’t have to. Given the newness of the movement to garden for wildlife rather than solely for aesthetic appeal, Rogers found that little formal training exists for native plant enthusiasts. So he spent roughly 100 hours watching Zoom webinars on the topic. As a result of his efforts, he now holds a Chesapeake Bay Landscape Professional certification.
One of the areas of wisdom Rogers often provides to clients is how to obtain government funding for sustainable gardening projects—specifically those that address storm water management, a particular area of interest for local and state governments. He also sees himself as part of the solution to the perpetual supply chain problems that often plague gardeners when searching for native plants. He is currently sourcing and delivering two to three thousand plants per season.
When asked what style of garden design he creates, Rogers said he doesn’t see his work fitting neatly into the conventional design terms frequently used, such as formal or cottage garden. Instead, he describes his designs as imitations of Maryland’s meadows, forests, and verge areas. Usually, his designs are roughly 50% semi-evergreen ground cover plants and 50% seasonal-interest plants.
When working with a new customer, Rogers first aims to understand that individual’s vision and then assess the potential size and placement of the garden. He tries to match garden size to customers’ abilities and expertise levels, emphasizing the importance of a customer’s first garden being a success. He often finds himself taking on the role of teacher during a consultation.
Ground preparation, Rogers noted, is another challenge he tackles regularly. At first, he used arborist wood chips to cover existing lawns, but he recently began using rolls of heavyweight craft paper and found that it works just as well to smother unwanted turf or plants prior to new garden installations. He hopes the new method will gain traction with the wider gardening community, since hauling in woodchips can be a logistical headache.
Even though Rogers is relatively new to Laurel, he has already made a noticeable impact on our area. When he moved here, he did not know any local gardeners. Now he writes a column on native gardening for the Laurel Independent, provides consultations through Vibrant Gardening, and arranges a monthly happy hour for native gardeners to socialize at local eateries. Besides growing native gardens, Jimmy Rogers is also growing the Laurel gardening community.
For those interested, Jimmy Rogers can be reached via his website vibrantgardening.com or via email at nativegardenguy@gmail.com.
Upcoming Holiday Parade
Last year’s Oldtown holiday parade was delightful, in large part due to the sizable increase in parade participants. I love a good parade, so let’s do this again. This year, the Holiday Parade and Armory Illumination will be on December 5. To sign up, contact Gina Wade at gwade@laurel.md.us. If you need some jolly entry ideas, email me at oldtownvoices@gmail.com.
Caitlin Lewis holds a Master’s Degree in Education from Covenant College. She worked as a high school English teacher both in the U.S. and Greece, but currently works at home raising her four children and writing her column.
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