Presumably you've followed my advice and had the builders in laying your newly acquired house. Either that or you ignored my Essential List for Second Life prefabrications and found your very own place. Either way you'll have further tasks ahead of you. One of those tasks is gardening. Yes that's right readers it's time to don those cardigans and slippers and make your parents proud, it's gardening time!

It's true to say that even the most magnificent houses and buildings in Second Life would look naked without some attention to the foliage surrounding them. In order to stop your prized possession looking bare and satisfy yourself that the mortgage is indeed worth it, you should take time, and care to plant your virtual home with the flowers, shrubs and trees that suit it best.

Welcome once more to a Second Life Essential list, this time for the practicing gardeners out there among you all. It's of course wise to point out that there are vast garden centers and options for foliage in Second Life, I couldn't possibly cover them all so I will try my best to offer my personal favourites in order to give you a start!

Heart

Without doubt Dolly & Lilith Heart's Garden Centre is a one-stop shop for the majority of your gardening need. Low prim, high quality plants are on offer on the 6 sims that make the Heart empire. Starting on a mainland sim it's unmistakable the growth Heart has had since it's inception in 2006. One you learn the plants on offer at this immense garden centre you'll begin to notice Heart plants all over the grid. Clearly a popular solution to your gardening needs.

Whether you're looking for Tropical plants to feature in your idyllic beach home, or marshland plants to feature in your very own forest, Heart won't let you down. With Topiaries and Arboretums you can add further depth to your landscaped home. Heart is mostly made of prim plants, there are a few sculpt options here however but the majority of plants and trees are textured prims.

You can purchase plants in many ways at Heart. You can chose to walk along the classically laid out garden centre and purchase plants individually or you can also purchase sets with an additional discount if you're looking for more than one or two plants. There are also vendor walls in place where you can see the offerings in the categories of landscape architecture, rock formations, tropicals, flowers, marshland and trees in one complete place. Fairly new to the offerings at Heart are the Meadow Patches; expanses of flowers helping you cover a larger area with these richly textured plants and all relatively low prim. Also if you're not sure about which plants should go together or not, Heart has some offerings of complete layouts saving you the trouble of placing the prims etc. The prices at Heart are also competitive, allowing you to give your Second Life home a true living, breathing feel.

Botanical

If you have wandered the pathways at Heart and not found what you're looking for, or perhaps you want some sculpts to aid you in adding depth to your gardening in Second Life, then Botanical at Straylight might be the very place for you. Another truly popular location favored by many sim owners, the trees especially are among some of the most realistic you can purchase in Second Life.The area at Botanical is somewhat different to Hearts manicured walkways, and owner Kriss Lehmann chooses to go down the location, location, location theme. You can see all trees and plants in-situ in this beautifully crafted sim. Also there is a central area with all the packs and options laid out for those who want to browse a store rather than a sim.

Botanical does offer a smaller collection of flowers than Heart, favoring more sculpt trees and further landscaping concepts. The sculpt walkways and water on offer at Botanical will help you to recreate mulch walkways and flowing streams on your sim while the particle effects of the Will-o-Wisp and Butterfly emitters will help to add some fantasy to your creations. In addition you can purchase wonderful firefly emitters, light beams, rainbow beams and sound effects depending on the area you're creating.

New Trails

Following on from the sculpt goodness of Botanical the next logical step for gardeners would be New Trails. Situated on another lovingly crafted, landscaped sim, the products on offer here are equal in quality to Heart and Botanical.

Taking a walk towards the shop area through ruined pillars you walk among the trees which help show you one of the reasons I really love New Trails, the textures, especially on the trees feature a wonderful fantasy-esque feel with almost glittering leaves. You can bear witness to another favourite product of mine and that's the light beams. Of course Botanical also features light beams and rainbow beams which move in time with the SL sky, but the menu-driven beams on offer at New Trails offers great diversity in colour and length, adding great depth to the lit areas in your virtual garden.

The shop at New Trails is tastefully located in a greenhouse building and offers you many options when purchasing your plants, even a copyable version for those of you with bigger parcels to cover. The majority of the stock here is a little more on the fantasy edge of foliage than reality, however there are still options for those of you who prefer realism over fantasy. You can even buy Bonsai trees at New Trails and they do look fantastic! Relatively new additions to new trails are the wonderful 1 prim sculpt flowers. Still a small range of those, they will help you cover a larger area if prims are at a minimum.

If you fancy something a little on the quirkier side of realistic garden accessories, then there are a few small places which have some specialized trees and such. Akeyo is one such place. They only in-fact feature one garden piece and it's the topiaries pictured below. They are simply brilliant, and I personally love them. You'll also see them featured in many sims who chose to be a little less mainstream with their planting.

Of course another very popular location is Happy Mood. A wondrous feel good sim, which features some of the most adorable bunnies in Second Life, also has a small yet succinct selection of garden essentials including the gorgeous clock tree which I'm sure will make a fantastic addition if the theme of your house suits it!

If water plays a key point in your landscaping, you might want to check out the options available at Artis Natur brought to you by the Adam & Eve creators Sachi Vixen and Damen Gorilla. There are multiple textured styles for waterfalls and streams at Artis, along with low prim sculpt trees (which you can touch to change the seasons) and wildflower beds with particle emitters for butterflies and bugs.
No matter what your garden theme is, you'll be sure to find something suitable in Second Life, the places mentioned above should hopefully aid you to make a start on your quest to become the next great landscaper.

Finally an impassioned plea. It's very easy to be tempted by textures and full perm sculpt maps the gardening markets appear filled with of late. While these do help in many cases keep costs to a minimum it is also true that many are also lower quality than you'll buy in these Second Life garden zones. While it is true that unplanted lands look barren, it is also true that low quality sculpts/ textures won't help you achieve an atmosphere. Your home, your store, your chill out zone should leave its visitors with an emotion. If it's dark and grungy or a fantasy realm or even a lush woodland forest it all leaves your guests with an emotion, please make sure the lasting memory or your land isn't of low quality.