The world’s rarest plants are on display this weekend in Raleigh. In one man’s backyard.

For eight weekends a year, Tony Avent opens his obsession to the public.

Rain lilies, giant ferns, showstopping titan arums, and trilliums so rare they have yet to be named decorate his private botanical haven in rural south Raleigh. Called Juniper Level Botanic Garden after its surrounding unincorporated community, the grounds contain 27,000 plant varieties — many of which don’t exist outside Avent’s 28-acre property. Thousands are native to the area; others hail from far-flung soils in South Africa, Argentina, Montenegro, Mexico, Taiwan and Slovenia.

“Very few places can really approach it,” said Mark Weathington, director of the JC Raulston Arboretum at North Carolina State University. “It is one of the best plant collections, I was going to say in the country, but really anywhere in the world in terms of the number of plant types and the depth of their specialized collections.”

At 66, Avent is perpetually tan with blue eyes and frost-white hair. His passion has defined his life. He started selling terrariums at age 5 in west Raleigh and went on to study horticultural science at NC State. In 1986, Avent and his late wife, Michelle, began to cultivate plants on two acres in their backyard.

With no children, they raised a botanical garden. They had a waterfall installed to drown out passing traffic. Over time, the couple purchased neighbors’ land and expanded their collection. Tony traveled across the country and globe to retrieve singular selections. For income, he started a nursery, crossbreeding variations to bring unique hybrids to market.

And they eventually added another waterfall.

“I created this craziness,” he said from the garden last Sunday. “We’ve done 100 trips, collecting plant material. We bring it back. We propagated it. We trial it. We research it. We photograph it. And then if it’s really awesome, we propagate it and share it with other people.”

Avent now lives on an adjoining property in southern Wake County with his second wife, Anita. He converted his two former houses at Jupiter Level into offices, where he and a staff of 50 full-time employees run Plant Delights Nursery, which ships through mail-orders. Purple agaves are current top sellers. All profits from the nursery, Avent said, are “plowed back” into the garden.

Twice a season, eight times a year, Juniper Level welcomes casual visitors. The first spring open session was last weekend; the second runs from May 10 to 12. After that, the next public garden day will be in July.

“Nobody ever leaves here with their minds not completely exploded,” he said.

The collection is spread across three garden sections and two nursery units. A path meanders through the main wooden gardens, past distinct areas like a bog zone, which supports carnivorous, fly-eating plants that thrive in soppy, wet soil. Then there is a popular crevice garden where plants accustomed to the aridity of the Middle East or American Southwest grow from concrete.

While leading a tour last weekend, Avent estimated he could probably identify 99% of the plants he passed by sight.

“Speaking as a real plant-nut myself, he is pretty obsessive and encyclopedic in his knowledge,” Weathington said. “He has better records, quite frankly, than almost any botanic garden I’ve ever been to.”

Records are what distinguish a botanical garden from a regular garden. Since starting Juniper Level, Avent has chronicled more than 8,700 plant histories, including their Latin names, plant families, dates planted, when they flower, and their wild site location. NC State researchers are frequent guests at the garden, as are post-doctoral students from other schools who have spent several days studying at the southern Wake site.

“The research is huge,” Avent says. “That’s why we exist.”

Avent, a one-time News & Observer gardening columnist, espouses the wonders and simplicity of plants. They’ve been shown to communicate with each other. They inspire awe. The spikes of certain agaves stretch 30 feet high while the amorphophallus titanium, or corpse flower, emits a stench not unlike rotting meat during its rare blooms.

But he stresses many foreign and distinct plants are accessible to hobbyists. Rejecting the emphasis some place on native plants — the belief that growing what originates locally is best — Avent argues that like people and animals, plants often succeed in different environments. He called the native plant ethos “hogwash” and its supporters “eco-Nazis,” which might not win him fans from the other side of this divisive issue. (It wouldn’t be the first time Avent has sparked controversy in the plant world.)

The irony, NC State’s Weathington says, is that Juniper Level offers one of the best native plant collections anywhere.

Sustaining a long-term future for the botanical garden has become a growing priority. In 2019, Tony and Anita gifted the property to the JC Raulston Arboretum. The transfer will complete when Tony either retires or dies.

To ready this transition, the garden and arboretum have begun fundraising a $20 million endowment to ensure Juniper Level’s maintenance in perpetuity. Weathington says the arboretum could manage the task today, if something were to happen to Avent, but it would be tough. On June 14, Avent will open his private home garden for a fundraising event at $1,000 a ticket.

“I would retire tomorrow if I could,” he said. But not everyone is convinced.

“Knowing Tony, he will never give up the control and turn it over to the university completely until he dies,” Weathington said. “The garden is just a major part of what gives his life meaning. It has been a labor of love. And quite honestly, Tony is certain nobody else can do it as well as him.”

How to go

Juniper Level Botanic Garden at 9241 Sauls Road, Raleigh, is open to the public, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., on May 10, 11 and 12. Admission is free but donations are accepted. For information, go to juniperlevelbotanicgarden.org.

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