Comments (0) Best Place to Buy Garden Supplies - 2000
OK Hatchery Feed & Garden Store
Yeah, the Bug Store's cuter -- but you can't exactly walk in and ask for gopher bait. At the OK Hatchery Feed & Garden Store in Kirkwood, you step into a cloud of peculiar grainy smells and see row upon row of stuff. The guys behind the counter are wonderfully cost-conscious ("This one's $2.20; maybe you'd want the smaller one?"). The merchandise isn't precious, either: Upscale garden stores sell waterproof clogs for $75; OK's Sloggers cost $12.99. They also sell things like breathable fabric tree wrap, protein hoof treatment, udder balm, deer repellent and microorganisms, and they stock cages of every size, so you can catch and release your yard's trespassers (or keep 'em as pets). Need some Old Country crockery or a copper weathervane? Want your finches' thistle dipped out of one of a row of aluminum trash cans, each chock-full of wild seed? "Safflower's the one the squirrels don't like," a salesperson explains, "and the ugly birds like grackles don't like it, either." In the great scheme of green-handled, pansy-printed ergonomic garden supplies, OK's a grackle itself. Still, it has its own cuteness: garden ornaments of Pan, the Blessed Mother and a spotted Bambi, and that big round retirees' favorite, the bird clock that tweets a different tune every hour. Time's passing. Inside the OK Hatchery -- open since 1927 -- you need the reminder.
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