Dark skies and a chilly wind whipped across the sunny parking lot on Main and Vine in West Bend on Saturday morning during the annual Roots & Branches Plant Sale.
“We’re doing as best as we can,” said Judy Zunker is co-chair of the plant sale.
Dressed as if she was gearing up to shovel snow, Zunker spoke with hood pulled up and a cold tear running down her face.
“It never fails every year we have wind and cold temperatures and we do the best we can.”
Zunker laughed when reminded that one year they even had some deer radar in to feast on the parking lot of plants.
“We have a patrol at night watching our plants and yes there were deer they had to scare out of our plants,” she said. “That would have been a surprise to come back in the morning and have all our plants chewed off.”
The plant sale features locally grown, winter-hardy perennials and some locally grown annuals.
Some of the shade-to-sun perennials include Bearded Iris, Bee Balm ‘Purple Rooster,’ Coneflower, purple, Variegated Jacob’s ladder and Shasta Daisy ‘Snow Lady’ (on a side note – I once had a hamster named Shasta Daisy Snow Lady)
Perennials are $6 pots or five or more for $5. Annual flats are $15 and all Petunias are $11 per flat (except Wave Petunia).  Geraniums are $4.
Roots & Branches is a non-profit organization and all money raised goes back into the community.
The sale is cash only and runs until noon on Saturday.