City Farmers Nursery: A Little Bit of Country in City Heights

Everything You Need to Know About City Farmers Nursery

There's a thing people miss about City Farmers Nursery, and it changes how you see the whole place: it isn't a garden center that happens to keep a few animals out back. It's a 1.5-acre working urban farm that happens to sell plants — with mini donkeys, a goat herd that belongs to a local milk co-op, and chickens, ducks and turkeys wandering their yards, all tucked into a block of City Heights off Euclid Avenue.

It's been there since 1972, when Bill Tall — Farmer Bill — started it as a roadside stand. His son Sam runs it now. Fifty-plus years later it's still family-owned, still giving away gardening advice for free, and still, improbably, a place where you can stand on a city street in San Diego and be looked at by a donkey.

Admission is free. It's open Wednesday through Sunday. And it is, hands down, one of the best no-cost outings in the city for anyone with kids, a garden, or an hour to kill. Here's everything I'd tell you before you go.

Quick Facts

• Where: 3110 Euclid Ave, San Diego, CA 92105 (City Heights)
• Cost: Free to walk in — it's a working retail nursery, so you come as a customer, not a ticket holder
• Hours: Wednesday–Sunday, 9 a.m.–5 p.m. Closed Monday and Tuesday. Extended to 7 p.m. during December, with special hours in spring and around the holidays
• Phone: (619) 284-6358
• Who's there: Mini donkeys Darla and Alfalfa, goats, chickens, ducks, turkeys, and seasonal chicks
• What else: California natives, drought-tolerant plants, organic vegetables, fruit trees, bonsai, pond and aquascape supplies, beekeeping and homesteading gear, bulk soils and fertilizers
• My pro move: Go on a weekday morning right at 9 a.m. The animals are most active, the staff actually have time to talk, and you'll have the place close to yourself. Then walk next door to Nate's Garden & Grill for lunch.

Fifty Years, Two Generations, and a Roadside Stand

Most nurseries are retail operations with a greenhouse. City Farmers is something older and stranger than that, and the history explains why.

Bill Tall opened it in 1972 as a small roadside stand. His idea was that a nursery should give away knowledge as freely as it sold plants — free gardening advice to anyone who walked up, no purchase required. That principle is still the operating logic of the place half a century later, and it's why the staff here will spend fifteen minutes diagnosing a sick lemon tree from a photo on your phone.

The business grew into the acre-and-a-half it occupies now, and Sam Tall, Bill's son, runs it today. It stayed family-owned the whole way through, which in San Diego retail is close to a miracle.

The community work is real rather than decorative. City Farmers helps local schools build gardens, supplies educational programs, donates regularly to area nonprofits, and runs free workshops throughout the year. The nursery was voted 2025 Best Plant Nursery in the Nation, an award it displays prominently and, having looked at what it actually does, has a decent claim to.

The Animals: Who You'll Actually Meet

This is the part that turns a plant errand into an outing, and it's worth knowing who lives here.

Darla and Alfalfa are the mini donkeys, and they are the headliners. They're used to visitors and entirely unbothered by them.

The goats are the surprise. They're part of a local milk co-op — these are working animals, not props — and they come to the fence to greet people.

The poultry yards hold chickens, ducks, and turkeys, and they are genuinely entertaining to watch for longer than you'd expect. If you're considering backyard chickens, the nursery sells seasonal chicks in rotating breeds through the year, plus the feed and supplies to keep them.

One important framing, in the nursery's own words: the animals are their pets. This is not a petting zoo and it isn't set up like one. You're a guest visiting someone's farm animals, which is a better experience than a petting zoo and asks a little more of you in return — read the signage, don't feed anything, and keep small hands where they're told.

The Perfect Day Itinerary

• 9:00 a.m. — Arrive at opening. Head straight back to the animals before the day warms up; the donkeys and goats are liveliest early.
• 9:45 a.m. — Walk the grounds properly. The native and drought-tolerant sections are the most useful part of the nursery for anyone actually gardening in San Diego, and the inventory rotates seasonally.
• 10:30 a.m. — Ask a question. Soil testing, plant diagnosis, and space planning are all services here, and the advice is free. Bring a photo of whatever's dying in your yard.
• 11:30 a.m. — Lunch at Nate's Garden & Grill next door — local fare, live music, dog-friendly patio — or browse Inecui Flowers for locally grown stems.
• Afternoon — You're in City Heights, so stay. Cafeina Cafe roasts direct-trade coffee from Honduras and El Salvador a few minutes away, and Thanh Tinh Chay serves 200-plus Vietnamese vegan dishes on El Cajon Boulevard.

Free Classes and Events Worth Planning Around

City Farmers runs free workshops and classes all year, and the fall calendar is unusually good:

• Fall Harvest Festival — October 10, 2026. The big one.
• Hillsides, Slopes, and Erosion Control — October 18. Genuinely useful if you own a San Diego lot with a grade, which is most of them.
• San Diego Microclimates: Gardening 101 — October 25. The single most useful class on this list for anyone new to gardening here. San Diego has wildly different growing conditions within a few miles, and most new residents learn that the expensive way.
• Citrus Care Class — October 25.
• Growing Cool Season Flowers — October 31.

They also publish a free year-round planting guide built specifically for Southern California's mild winters, which is worth downloading whether or not you ever visit.

What to Know Before You Go

• Check the day first. They're closed Monday and Tuesday, which catches people out more than anything else about this place.
• It's a working nursery, not an attraction. Wear shoes you don't mind getting dusty and expect hoses, wheelbarrows, and dirt.
• December runs late. Hours extend to 7 p.m. through the holiday season, and spring brings its own extended hours.
• Bring a photo of your problem plant. The free diagnosis is the most underused thing they offer.
• Street parking. It's a City Heights block, so give yourself a minute, especially on weekends.
• Don't feed the animals. They're pets with their own diets, and the staff will tell you the same thing more politely.

It's the outing I recommend when someone wants to get their kids outside without spending money, or when someone's just moved here and can't work out why nothing in their yard survives — which, it turns out, are the same trip.

For more ways to get outdoors around town, browse our Get Outside guides, or start with the City Heights neighborhood guide if you're exploring the area.