Hello folks and welcome to the Arboretum! It's a nice place to get away from the hum drum of it all! Take some time to walk and jog, or to just love nature. This is one of the best places to get away on Dominaria!

This is based on two brews I made called "The Zoo" and "The Aquarium" which you can find here - The Zoo and the Aquarium | Article by Abe Sargent (coolstuffinc.com). And who is the President of the Arboretum?

Yedora was elected President from the Council that includes Multani, Verdeloth, Nemata, and Kamahl! This beefy Treefolk Druid turns any dying non-token creature into a Forest, and that's quite flavorful. Yedora grows Forests using the natural fertilizer of dead bodies, and they have great results! All of the cards here meet the flavor of an Arboretum so, for example, we do not have Beast Within, and ditto for Kodama's Reach. But Cultivate? Rampant Growth? Wall of Roots? Absolutely! I am also not running good Tribal answers that make no sense in an Arboretum, like Mold Shambler which has flavor text of nature getting angry not mold being shaped into a form.)

Plants and Flowers

Let's start with Plants and flowers! The first 2-drop is a freshly Standard legal 0/2 with Defender, and on arrival to the battlefield (ETB) you can dig six and put any land into your hand and the rest on the bottom of your library, which is nice card flow and land grabbing. The latter is a 1/1 that taps for any color of mana, another addition to your ramping fun times!

Check these two Plants with defender! The Offshoot is a 1-drop 0/3 that has a key landfall trigger to gain life, and we have ramp and cards like Explore to drop extra lands (people Explore an Arboretum). The Arch is a 2-drop 0/4 that can tap normally to gain a life for free and then you can pay and sacrifice it to Learn, which lets you discard to draw.

Check out this pair! The Vine is another 0/3 Defender for one mana. You can tap it and a pair of mana to sacrifice a dork with defender and draw a card, which is better than Overgrown Arch, so if you control them both, this is the one you'll lean into. This also gives you mad card flow since we have a bunch of defender dorks like the ones I've shown, or Sylvan Caryatid and Wall of Roots. I thought about Wall of Mulch, but that only sacrifices Walls not the other defenders. The Stomper is a 4/4 3-drop with vigilance that resembles a Plant cut into the form of a Dinosaur. When it ETBs, you can grab a basic from your deck, and put it onto the battlefield, so it's ramp on a stick. Then it cannot swing or block until you have 7 lands, but with vigilance it can do both without opening yourself up to various issues.

Let's finish things up with this pair. The Wall is a classic kitchen table 2-drop, an 0/4 defender that draws a card. It is the first card I thought of when I had the idea to build an Arboretum! The enchantment is a 1-drop that makes X mana in your first main phase equal to your target opponent's Island count which could be a few each turn given how common the color and how common the pain fetches are at getting dual lands.

Treefolk and Trees

And now let's turn to the Treefolk tribe! There are three Treefolk that have power and toughness equal to your Forest count that are here, and then the Dourbark is a 4-drop that has power and toughness to your Forests and your Treefolk too! Given how often you'll get Forests from the death of your stuff, this seems pretty awesome and game winning! Kurbis celebrates that harvest! It is an which gets X +1/+1 counters, so it's a Hydra in Treefolk form. Given how much mana this deck makes, that seems like another game winner in tribal form.

The Shaman is a 5-drop 3/5 a bit small for its cost, with the ability to tap to exile a Treefolk from your graveyard and put two Forests into play tapped and ready to pump your team. Other than the obvious flavor of Regrowth I don't have any recursion here so feel free to tap this thing all day long. The Reach is a five-cost instant that is a Treefolk! You can make a 2/5 Treefolk token and then when a Forest ETBs under your control you can bring this back to your hand, and given how often your stuff is dying and ramp and natural land drops will trigger this it seems pretty powerful from where I am sitting.

Check out these two Treefolk that begin with the letter "G." The 4-drop is a powerful 5/4 with trample and then Learns when it ETBs. I like the idea of a Treefolk acting as a teacher at the Arboretum giving those daily speeches about the flora. I also tossed in Treefolk Harbinger to play into this flavor role as well as another dork to be seen later. Then we have the 6-drop with flash, reach, and a 4/5 body that pumps your team by +2/+2, which is a wonderful combat trick after you have been attacked to save your team or on your turn to pump attackers to lethal. Note that this also untaps your stuff as well, and you can target who gets this benefit to gang up on the big bad who just attacked the tapped out vulnerable player with the low life total.

Let's finish up Treefolk with this pair! The Storyteller is the one I was talking about before. Anyone who casts a non-dork spell forces their foes to all draw, so that will be loads here since people have been pulling Ravenous Chupacabra for Murder and Flametongue Kavu for Lightning Bolt and Eternal Witness for Regrowth all over the block. In our deck, we have a ton of dorks, 36, so you'll be less likely to give your foes cards from your things. The Yew is a 5-drop 5/4 which is on curve and then when it dies you can search your library for a dork with a power or toughness of 6 or more and then put it into your hand!

Fungus and Thallids

I don't have that many Fungi and Saproling makers, just four. Let's look at them in turn, first the Spore Flower which is on flavor twice (Fungus, flower). This 2-drop 0/1 Fungus gets a spore counter on your upkeep and you can pull three off to Fog for the turn, so you can do this every third turn. I also tossed in the Fog effect called Spore Cloud which is a game winner. The Farmer is a 2-drop 0/2 that gets spore counters and then can remove three to make a Saproling and then sacrifice those for two life.

Our last two Fungus are this pair. The 'Mound is a 5-drop 3/3 with landfall make a 1/1 Saproling. This can be chomped by the Farmer for life or pumped with your Great Oak Guardian or just to chump block attackers. The Sapherd is a 3-drop 2/2 that ETBs with a 1/1 Saproling and a Sapherd makes flavor and mechanical sense in an Arboretum, not a Shepherd.

Other Flavors

Since Multani is on the ruling Council I figured I would toss in a pair of this Forest-loving Avatar. They are both 6-drops with X/X stats. The first one that was printed has an X equal to the total card count in every player's hand, *cough multiplayer cough*. That is a game winner, and it has shroud, so nothing is targeting him. The latter version X is equal to your land count in play and the graveyard, so that, as we mentioned with our Treefolk, should be a lot with your Forest making form your creatures dying. You can also spend two mana, bounce two lands (landfall, get dorks back) and then return him from your graveyard to your hand, which is totally worth it. Multani also looks like he belongs in an Arboretum, right?

Synergy Cards

Check out the power of your Grave Gardener when your lands are turned into dorks. If I turn a Forest into a 3/3, and then it dies, then it just becomes a Forest again. Now most of the "lands turning into dorks" just don't fit the flavor of an Arboretum, like Living Plane (and that's hundreds of dollars) and Nature's Revolt. But these three do. Kamahl's Will works since he is on the Council, and then you can also kill an opposing dork instead if you do not control your leader, or both if you do. Natural Affinity turns all dorks, yours and your foes', into 2/2s, and if you control your Commander, in response to an opposing Wrath of God or Damnation this is a blow out since you'll keep your lands as flipped over Forests and they'll lose theirs, and the Awakening is a three cost that makes your lands 2/2, reach, haste, and indestructible and with your extra lands this trinity can really win the game out of nowhere.

Card Flow and Creature Dropping

Let's turn to pure card flow and dork playing! Can you see why I think Harmonize makes sense here? Don't you go to outdoor places like Arboretums to Meditate? Yup! This is on flavor! I pulled a Forest for the Turntimber sorcery. Turntimber sounds on theme and I have the Grove here as well. This seven-cost sorcery can put a creature from the top 7 cards on your library onto the battlefield, and if it cost 3 or less put some +1/+1 counters on it. With 35 non-Commanders here and loads of beefier ones, that's likely to be a strong few options in your 7. And if you just needed the land, drop it!

Answers

Now let's turn to answers! Nature's Claim is a beloved Naturalize effect since it just costs one mana but gives four life. Veil of Summer is a powerful one-mana answer to Black and Blue counters and removal effects since your stuff cannot be countered, gets hexproof from Blue or Black, and then you also can draw a card. I also tossed in Heroic Intervention since an Arboretum is often an Intervention of staff to put flora things together.

Let's turn to two more removal spells. The 'Grapple is a five-mana Treefolk instant that can destroy anything that is not a dork. That includes lands, planeswalkers and the artificial. If you control your Commander or another Treefolk, this is a cantrip and replaces itself, which is nice card flow. Obviously, roots would make sense in an Arboretum as people often trip into them. It's also fetchable with Treefolk Harbinger. The Mold is a four-mana slower but faster sorcery that can destroy a land, artifact or enchantment, but not a planeswalker like the 'Grapple. This definitely fits the flavor theme as mold is in Arboretums, and then it's a very strong powerhouse that can hit three key card types. Also, in the Mold flavor I am running Moldervine Cloak for enchanting your dork and swinging. Both are great removal!

Let's turn to two answers in aura form! The first one is a 4-drop that can only target non-flyers. Then you tap it and it cannot untap as normal, so it's a Green color shifted version of Dehydration effects from Blue. Again, you can definitely see Roots tripping up guests. The second aura is a 2-drop Treefolk aura, so it is also searchable. It turns the enchanted dork into a 0/4 Treefolk with no abilities, so it's great on an opposing Commander to answer them without giving the ability to be recast from their Command Zone with a tax. Removing abilities can really shut down things like Sliver Overlord and Sisay, Weatherlight Captain. Love this pair loads!

Mana, Ramp, Lands

And now let's turn to ramp and lands. Most of my ramp is obvious and fits the flavor, like Nature's Lore, Cultivate, and Rampant Growth, but not things like Explosive Vegetation or Kodama's Reach. The Elemental here might not be our tribes of warrant, but it's a flavor hit. Three mana, with two +1/+1 counters, and remove one for two mana and then ramp a basic land, and you can do it at instant speed. I also love this with Turntimber Grove giving it a +1/+ counter. The Commons are here for a few reasons. First of all, if you have turned a dork into a Forest post-death, then you can bounce it back and recast it by dropping this. The other card in Mono-Green that does this is called Jungle Basin, which doesn't fit the theme of my Arboretum, but is a big mechanical hit. I often see a central commons area for folks to relax in an Arboretum, so it makes flavor sense.

Check out these two lands! The Garden makes a 0/1 Plant on arrival to the battlefield which fits the flavor of this deck and mechanics. Doesn't having a Garden work in an Arboretum? Many of these have Mazes and Labyrinths that are often key selling features of the place. I tossed in both Maze of Ith and Mystifying Maze to represent those and keep us safe from attacks.

Check out this ETB tapping maker of Green! This has hideaway four. Then you can tap this and a Green and then cast the hideaway'ed card if you have at least 10 power, pretty easy here, right? And then a moss-covered Bridge makes so much sense in this brew, and Bridges are underused in Green lands, but there are some non-Mono-Green Bridges out there, but this is very much on flavor.

Ready for the decklist? I got you!!!

The Arboretum | Commander | Abe Sargent

• Commander (1)
• 1 Yedora, Grave Gardener

• Creatures (35)
• 1 Dauntless Dourbark
• 1 Deadwood Treefolk
• 1 Dungrove Elder
• 1 Elvish Farmer
• 1 Everbark Shaman
• 1 Fertilid
• 1 Floriferous Vinewall
• 1 Gnarled Professor
• 1 Great Oak Guardian
• 1 Heartwood Storyteller
• 1 Ilysian Caryatid
• 1 Jaddi Offshoot
• 1 Kalonian Twingrove
• 1 Kurbis, Harvest Celebrant
• 1 Multani, Maro-Sorcerer
• 1 Multani, Yavimaya's Avatar
• 1 Nemata, Grove Guardian
• 1 Orchard Strider
• 1 Overgrown Arch
• 1 Portcullis Vine
• 1 Rootless Yew
• 1 Seedguide Ash
• 1 Spore Flower
• 1 Sporemound
• 1 Sylvan Caryatid
• 1 Topiary Stomper
• 1 Tree of Redemption
• 1 Treefolk Harbinger
• 1 Verdeloth the Ancient
• 1 Vine Trellis
• 1 Vinelasher Kudzu
• 1 Wall of Blossoms
• 1 Wall of Roots
• 1 Warden of the Woods
• 1 Yavimaya Sapherd

• Instants (10)
• 1 Heroic Intervention
• 1 Kamahl's Will
• 1 Molder
• 1 Natural Affinity
• 1 Nature's Claim
• 1 Reach of Branches
• 1 Rootgrapple
• 1 Spore Cloud
• 1 Veil of Summer
• 1 Wrap in Vigor

• Sorceries (12)
• 1 Circuitous Route
• 1 Creeping Mold
• 1 Cultivate
• 1 Explore
• 1 Harmonize
• 1 Nature's Lore
• 1 Nissa's Pilgrimage
• 1 Rampant Growth
• 1 Regrowth
• 1 Sylvan Awakening
• 1 Three Visits
• 1 Turntimber Symbiosis // Turntimber, Serpentine Wood

• Enchantments (4)
• 1 Carpet of Flowers
• 1 Lignify
• 1 Moldervine Cloak
• 1 Roots

• Lands (38)
• 30 Forest
• 1 Guildless Commons
• 1 Heart of Yavimaya
• 1 Khalni Garden
• 1 Maze of Ith
• 1 Mosswort Bridge
• 1 Mystifying Maze
• 1 Sapseep Forest
• 1 Turntimber Grove

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And there we are! So...what did you think of my Arboretum deck idea? Are you inspired to build your own? Anything obvious in flavor that I missed or that you liked? Just let me know in the comments below! Enjoy!