The great plant picks team has been hard at work this past year, and you'll see the results grandly displayed in the Central Park area of the Northwest Flower & Garden Show. Thirty horticultural experts from Oregon, Washington and British Columbia have just announced dozens of new winners that have undergone vigorous discussion and evaluation to emerge triumphant as the very best plants for our unique climate. The ambitious program, begun last year and funded by the Miller Botanical Garden Trust, has as its goal nothing short of creating a comprehensive list of the finest plants available for Northwest gardens. British gardeners, courtesy of the Royal Horticultural Society, have been aided by such an authoritative and useful list for nearly 200 years, and now with a total of more than 80 Great Plant Picks, and more to come, we're well on the way toward our own Northwest version.

Whether you're a beginning or veteran gardener, just starting a new garden or renovating an old one, there is no more challenging task than determining which plants are most garden-worthy. It should help to take a close look at the winning plants filling the show lobby. Even now at mid-winter the variety of bark, leaf and flower is impressive. The selected plants fall into three categories: trees and conifers, shrubs and vines, perennials and bulbs.

All plants nominated have to be hardy in USDA Zones 7 and 8 (that's us), long-lived, reasonably disease- and pest-resistant, have a long season (and preferably multiple seasons) of interest, be available in nurseries, and refrain from spreading too aggressively. My favorite criterion is the one that says plants must be "vigorous and easy to grow by a gardener of average means and experience." This means we can trust GPP to avoid the most fussy, delicate and expensive of plants that require coddling or specialized knowledge to grow well. Committee members rely not only on their own considerable knowledge, but travel to nurseries, private collections and public gardens to evaluate plant collections. The committee recently visited collections of witch hazel, pieris and clematis; more trials and evaluations are planned.

Selections include the very best species and cultivars of familiar plants such as pines, crocus, maples and hostas, as well as plants new and unusual. Fact sheets on all these winning plants are available on the Web at www.greatplantpicks.org, or by calling the program office at 206-363-4803.

Some of this year's unbeatable plant picks are:

Acer palmatum 'Osakazuki' is one of the smaller Japanese maples, with deeply lobed leaves that turn brilliant red in autumn.

Sciadopitys verticillata, Japanese umbrella pine, is a sturdy, textural evergreen tree that adds year-round interest to the garden. Large and columnar, it has olive-green needles, rounded cones and peeling red-brown bark.

Camellia x williamsii 'Donation' was nominated by designer Charles Price, who describes it as a tough and handsome evergreen shrub, covered in so much pink bloom you may find it a relief to see the last blossom fall.

Clematis 'Etoile Violette' is a small-flowered climber of the viticella type, with an abundance of violet-purple flowers in late summer through autumn.

Crocus tommasinianus is the first bulb chosen for GPP, and is ideal for naturalizing. It blooms in late winter in shades of silvery lilac to dark reddish purple.

Stipa gigantea, giant feather grass, forms a low, fat clump of foliage, throwing up tall golden blooms that create a haze of color from June through frost.

Geranium 'Salome' is a hardy workhorse of a perennial, with pale green leaves and pink flowers, veined and centered in deep violet.

Pulmonaria 'Benediction,' a lungwort named for local gardener Loie Benedict, brightens the early spring garden with masses of dark blue flowers held above silver spotted leaves.

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Collected Columns

Pacific Northwest magazine readers have long asked for a collection of Plant Life columns, and now, to celebrate the fourth anniversary of her weekly column, Valerie Easton has updated 68 of her most popular pieces and collected them into a new book. "Plant Life: Growing a Garden in the Pacific Northwest" (Sasquatch Books, 2002, $19.95) is arranged seasonally, with color photos by Richard Hartlage, taken over the course of one year in Valerie's own Lake Forest Park garden. There are photos, too, of the "Now In Bloom" feature for every week of the year, as well as personal musings and practical ideas on making and enjoying a garden year-round. Valerie will give two slide presentations about the new book and her garden at the Northwest Flower and Garden Show. She will speak on "Plant Life: A Personal View, Four Seasons on a Quarter Acre" at 9:45 a.m. Feb. 6 in the Hood Room, and again at 1 p.m. Feb. 8 in the Rainier Room. Or drop by the Seattle Times booth to meet Valerie, where she'll be signing books from 3 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. Feb. 8.

Valerie Easton is a horticultural librarian who writes about plants and gardens for Pacific Northwest magazine. Her e-mail address is vjeaston@aol.com.