KIMBERLY, Idaho — Owning a nursery is a dream come true for Pedro Garcia, who grew up in south-central Idaho. It’s been years in the making, but Roots Nursery finally held its grand opening last spring.

“It’s been a slow launch,” said Mandolyn Garcia, Pedro’s wife.

A landscape business came first. Pedro, with a degree in landscape architecture and a love for the business, opened Roots Landscaping six years ago.

Mandolyn, who is from north Idaho, and Pedro met at the University of Idaho. They moved to Twin Falls in 2015, wanting to be near Pedro’s extended family.

Pedro has always worked in landscaping, and Mandolyn taught high school science for 10 years. She still teaches for an online school part-time.

The two opened Roots Nursery in 2023, but they wanted to wait until they had a greenhouse, a shade structure and a variety of shrubs and trees before holding the grand opening last spring.

The nursery lies south east of Twin Falls on about 11 acres leased from a developer. The owner wasn’t ready to develop the land and leased it to the Garcias.

“It’s a pretty good relationship with the developer. We did landscaping for his commercial projects,” Mandolyn said.

While spring and summer are especially busy times for the nursery, this time of year is also busy.

“People want to get to projects they procrastinated on,” Mandolyn said.

The nursery is also having a fall clearance sale to make room for new inventory.

Because nursery owners always have to think a season ahead, the nursery is busy ordering Christmas trees, lining up suppliers and delivery dates.

As for plants — including flowers, vegetable starts, berries, shrubs and trees — the nursery carries high-quality native species and anything that will survive in the region, said Jo Schiffler, the nursery’s office manager.

Next year, they hope to offer more varieties of berries and fruit trees, she said.

The nursery has several suppliers, and the Garcias want to focus on those that are local.

In addition to plants, shrubs and trees, the nursery carries bulk hardscape materials such as rock, flagstone, gravel, mulch, dirt and compost. That dovetails nicely with the landscape business.

“As a nursery, we can supply our landscape company but also want to have a retail operation,” Mandolyn said.

They expect to expand the nursery and eventually want to grow all of the plants, shrubs and trees from seed and bareroot.

Right now, the emphasis is on trying to get the word out that the nursery is open for business, she said.

She expects to add employees next year and maybe one greenhouse because she and Pedro know they’ll be moving when the developer is ready to build on the leased land.

The plan is to have lots of greenhouses to propagate plants through the winter, she said.

“We want to grow our own everything,” she said.

Roots Nursery

Owners: Pedro and Mandolyn Garcia. He is 39 and she is 38.

Location: Kimberly, Idaho.

Acreage: Leased, about 11 acres.

Products: Shrubs, plants, trees, boulders, flagstone, bulk materials and compost; firepits and water features.

Other offerings: Workshops; family-friendly events; free delivery to Twin Falls and Kimberly.

Employees: Three full-time.

Affiliate company: Roots Landscaping.

Education: Pedro, bachelor’s degree in landscape architecture, University of Idaho; Mandolyn, bachelor’s degree in secondary education.

Family: Three sons, ages 9, 7 and 4.

Website: https://myrootsnursery.com/