The journal was established in March 2000 as a cooperative effort between the
University of Idaho and the
USDA Forest Service, with assistance from the
Natural Resources Conservation Service and the
USDA Agricultural Research Service. The Reforestation, Nurseries and Genetic Resources department of the USDA Forest Service were the originators of the idea of having a journal that covers
native plant species. This led to an agreement in the spring of 1999 between the Service and the Forest Research Nursery at the University of Idaho to publish material that would be incorporated into the first issue of the journal. The journal was published by the
Indiana University Press between the fall of 2004 and fall of 2010. It moved to the
University of Wisconsin Press in the spring of 2011. The founding
editor-in-chief was R. Kasten Dumroese. ==Abstracting and indexing==