About Boro Hill Nursery
Vermont-grown trees
A tree should feel as if it has always stood where it grows: rooted in the land, shaped by the weather, marking the passing of the seasons. At Boro Hill Nursery, we grow and plant trees for Vermont landscapes, hardy, honest, and built to last for generations. Every tree spends several years in our own field in Monkton. It’s grown in living field soil enriched with compost we make ourselves, then pruned and selected by hand. We favor hardy, disease-resistant cultivars and diverse plantings over monoculture, pairing fruit, shade, and ornamental trees with shrubs and perennials, so the whole landscape works as an ecosystem.
We work with homeowners, farms, and communities who want more than a tree in the yard. They want a landscape with purpose and a living legacy. From backyard orchards heavy with fruit to shade trees that frame a home, we choose each planting for its site and its people. We guide every step, from the first site visit and planting plan to installation and seasonal pruning. The person who grew your trees is the person who plants them, and every tree we install carries a one-year guarantee. These are landscapes that grow richer with time. They blossom in spring, offer shade in summer and color in fall, and hold their shape against the snow long after the day they were planted.
About Chris Urban
Chris Urban is a Vermont tree grower and the founder of Boro Hill Nursery, a sustainably run nursery growing hardy fruit, shade, and ornamental trees in Monkton, Vermont. His work rests on a simple belief: planting the right trees in the right places is one of the most lasting ways to care for the land and the community around it.
His story begins on the same Monkton land where Boro Hill grows today. Raised among its fields, Chris came to see the land as something to tend and pass on. He started the nursery to put stewardship, community, and environmental activism into practice, building a business with social and ecological well-being at its center.
As the climate changes, Chris believes we need more thriving trees, and trees suited to the conditions ahead. He keeps his trees affordable by selling locally, and keeps the nursery’s footprint small through careful, low-impact growing methods. Just as important, he works with customers at every stage, from choosing trees suited to their site to caring for them long after planting, so that each planting creates another steward of the land.
His approach is guided by conservationist Aldo Leopold, who wrote: “A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability and beauty of the biotic community.” That idea shapes every tree Boro Hill grows. Its trees are disease-resistant cultivars raised in Monkton soil rather than shipped in plastic containers from elsewhere. They’re fed with homemade compost, pruned by hand, and selected with a careful eye.
Chris stands behind every tree because he knows where it came from and how it was raised. If you’d like to enrich your landscape and plant for the future, he’d love to hear from you.