Review of Tutu’s Plants, Gardens and Nursery in Kailua-Kona

Barbara Bolton at Tutu’s Plants in Kailua-Kona trims a desert rose.

One of the fascinating things about life is meeting a new person I immediately admire and aspire to be, like Barbara Bolton at her nursery in Kailua-Kona. This woman is still going strong at whatever age she is, and I did not ask her when she was born. She’s older than me at 65, I’ll tell you that. Probably stronger than me, too.

She started this nursery in Kailua-Kona about 10 years ago. It’s still a work in progress, even after all of these years. I just lucked out when I found the nursery online in some obscure place. When I called, a guy answered the phone, I probably reached their home phone. He said you better speak to Barbara. She invited me down the following day. Because it’s a home-based operation, I figured it was only polite to call ahead of time.

Barbara asked: can you give me about 15 minutes to rest? She just came back from some event and had to take it easy for a little bit. This is not a nursery where you walk through rows of potted plants and make your selection. This nursery in Kailua-Kona is far up a long driveway and most plants are growing. Barbara just digs up your selection.

Although she refers to the gardens as a work in progress; it’s a masterful plan of design. So many steps, secret paths and clusters of flowers, vegetables, fruits; it’s hard to see where the property line ends. At one end, there is a lava wall about 30 feet high. Everything pretty much, except the soap ginger, was blooming. I thought I was after soap ginger, but as Barbara says, all ginger is invasive but soap ginger turns ugly when it stops blooming.

My good fortune also introduced me to two of her little dogs. One of them is blind, which caused me to freak out backing out down the driveway. Always love to meet dogs! They both followed me for the pets. The surprising thing was she only charged me $5.00 for 3 five-feet tall red ginger plants. That didn’t seem fair. I offered her twenty dollars and she insisted on going inside to make change. OK, fine, take the five bucks. That’s the kind of person she is. This is her passion. I understand passion. My passion is Sacramento real estate.

As I was about to leave, she showed me desert rose (adenium obesum). It’s a type of succulent that sort of grows like a bonsai. It has a fat trunk like an elephant plant. The stem is thick and knobby. It reaches 3 to 4 feet in height and produces vibrant pink flowers. As with most beautiful things in the world, often there is a drawback. The plant can kill you. So, just don’t eat it. Don’t plant it around pets or children.

Although Barbara mentioned how once she dug her fingernail into the stem, and later in the day stuck her fingernail into her mouth to remove a particle stuck in her teeth. People do that when they’re alone or they think nobody’s looking you know. Especially when you get older, there is little more annoying than a shred of spinach stuck between teeth. Ask any old geezer.

Immediately, after scraping her tooth, she tasted the putrid taste of the desert rose. It was awful. She spit and spit and spit. She asked, “Why would anybody eat that?” Good question. So, I feel OK about planting desert rose in my yard. There are a few places where the sprinklers don’t hit. Like many succulents, they don’t need a lot of fussing or water. But I can’t take any back to Sacramento because our winters would kill them.

Meeting Barbara and walking through her nursery in Kailua-Kona was such an Aloha moment. This is how a person should choose plants. It’s very organic and natural. You feel part of the ‘Aina. Barbara is delightful, knowledgeable and charming. If you’re ever in Kona, even if you don’t need any plants, you should go by and visit.

She calls her nursery Tutu’s Plants because tutu is a nickname in Hawaiian for grandparents. Grand + plants = Tutu’s Plants. If you’re driving up Hualalai from Queen’s Highway, it’s about .8 miles on the Mauka. You’ll see a small sign for Tutu’s Nursery and the driveway is to the left of that. I know because I followed GPS by mistake into a gated community, met the mail carrier and she gave me better directions. You gotta love Hawaii.