Steven Nikkila

The two images below are a good example of the background making an impression on the photograph. This photo has a light and busy top that draws the eye away from the monkshood flowers. It also has a busy bottom of the photo. Both of these are distractions This photo has a consistent upper backgound and a less cluttered bottom part. It makes the flowers stand out. It's a simple tip but worth while to remember - watch your backgrounds.

For me it would depend on the grass and how important is it to my winter landscape. Also does it stand up all winter or flop during the winter? If the latter I would cut it in the fall. Remember the more you can do in the fall to get your garden ready for spring the easier the spring should be. In the fall we all are in gardening shape, in the spring we're in questionable gardening shape and we are all OLDER!

Was your ground frozen at all or was it more of a crust of frost? How where the dug out?

Can you post some of the photos? I'm quite a visual person and sometimes there are clues visible but not in a description of a problem.

The long damages on the branch appears to be a previous wound, something that could of happen from the twine tying the tree up when moving, it could have been hit by machinery in the nursery. It doesn't appear to be healing, the bark would be enclosing the wood slowly, here it appears the wound is still spreading. Can it be pruned out? The bottom of the trunk appears to be the graft scar to me. Many our ornamental trees are grafted for various reasons, quicker growth, hardiness and such. The soil appears to be wet, can it be too wet? The is a topic on posting photos in the folder "Using the Forum" (https://forum.gardenatoz.org/index.php?/topic/66-posting-photos/) take a look and see if it helps.

Nice shot! I'm having a tough time trying to identify this pine by a photo of the cone and needles alone. The needles appear to be too long for a Scotch/Scot pine (Pinus sylvestris) and not long enough for a Austrian pine (Pinus nigra) the cone doesn't have a curved tip and appears to be too open for a Jack pine (Pinus banksiana). What color is the bark? How long are the needles?

If you choose to use an herbicide, yes painting the leaves should work. You could also cut the suckers and paint the cut with a herbicide. Personally I like Crickets method, cutting straight down and severing the roots and pulling the plant. Chance are you'll probably kill them by cutting them a few times since they don't have a whole shrub's worth of leaves to drive the sucker growth. But it is your garden and your choice.

I know we had trouble finding sturdy bamboo stakes too and ordered some quite a few years ago and we're still using them. I'll see if I can find where we got them from and will post it if I find out.

I was in that area a couple of times and saw some wonderful nurseries in the Boring, Oegon area. Some them have great display gardens but they where often wholesale nurseries that I'm not sure if they are open to the public. You could call ahead and ask them. The nurseries I saw were: Iseli Nursery, Stanley and Sons Nursery, Toby's Nursery, Patterson Nursery, and Don Schmidt Nursery. I visited there in 1995 and I'm not sure if all of them are still in business. It is definitely worth the drive to go look around. In Portland it's self there is a wonderful Japanese Garden in Washington Park. I would HIGHLY recommend going there. I'm going to look for some slides of that trip and may be able to post some here.

Here are the photos of the tree in question and its current wall. Here is what we think. The 1st wall covered perhaps 1/3 of the root system and 1/3 of the lower bark. The new wall would put the entire root system, the base of the tree and the remaining flare roots all at risk. We see 2 simple ways to forecast what will happen to the tree. One, cut a branch from the tree that has been growing since the first wall was made. (Might be one foot for every year; might have to shoot it down if the tree is branched real high.) Examine its growth rate from before the current wall and after the current wall. Two, trowel the soil away from the bark and see if it's rotted or if the cambium remained alive and healthy. If the bark hasn't rotted and the cambium is still intact, chances are the tree can also weather the new abuse. For what it's worth from two people who don't know the property, we don't think the land acquired in doing this is worth endangering the tree. We see a dead branch lying in front of the tree, if it's from this tree then it's already in trouble. PS - If you take down a branch to look at the growth rate, send us a photo of the leaves/buds. We're not only interested in the growth rate history. We wonder about the ID of the tree. It has a bark that looks unlike any hickory we've seen. We'd sure love to know what happens next.

I was helping install some new irrigation line this weekend. We got it in a 100 foot roll. When we went to put the line in the ground it was twisted from being rolled up for awhile. Putting this into the trench that was dug would have been a frustrating job. We would of had to put the line in and cover it with soil right away, which we didn't want to do until we tested the system for leaks and the line would probably just pop out from under the soil anyway. It was a bright sunny day and I decided to let the sun do the straightening out for me. Here's the line 10 minutes later. It has straightened out somewhat, but still a little kinky. And here's the line 30 minutes later, nice and relaxed and ready to be placed in the trench. Then splicing the line and adding the sprinkler heads was much easier with a relaxed line.

Thanks Dsmith74! We've fixed the link.

I can't tell what plant that is but maybe these are serving two purposes. One to keep traffic off the lawn the other might be to restrain an invasive plant, like artemisia or bamboo from getting loose.

It really isn't that hard to get to that far wall, there really is a path there the camera makes it seem more compressed then it really is.

The trumpet honeysuckle (Lonnicera sempervirens) is not as rampant of a grower as Japanese honeysuckle (L. japonica) but it can still grow to 20' depending upon it's support and is not invasive. In spring when in bloom it can be outstanding, especially when the plant is in full sun. If there is any re-blooming it is very spotty at best. There is no fragrance with this honeysuckle. It can be allowed to ramble along the ground and be a groundcover too.

Hi Carol, Sorry we haven't been back to this topic earlier. Check the stems for cankers, wounds that have a discolored area and dries out, and if you r plants have any cut that stem out below the damaged area. Watering could also be a problem with as dry as it has been even the water you are putting on the plants may not be enough. Please let us know how they are doing. There is another possible cause for this eriophyid mites. We discussed these in What's Up #141 that's posted on our website.

And to think I thought the red, orange black and gold painted mulches look bad. This really takes the "cake". Thanks for the photo, otherwise I may not have believed it. Now I'll be looking at all IHOPs for this type of mulch. But with the possibilities this type of mulch coloring will bring, I shudder to think. PS - Janet is yelling from the other room "Is this what we get for painting our allium seed heads blue?"

We recently received this email and made us wonder if any of you had hickory experience you can share? Hi Janet and Steven, Love love love your newsletter! We have a new cottage and we are planning to redo the landscaping on the slope leading down to the water. There is an existing 2 foot retaining wall at the top of the slope that butts up to a huge hickory tree. A landscaper is drawing up a design for the slope. She said that her block retaining wall will not butt up to the tree, instead it will be in front of it-she plans to add dirt to the base of the tree to bring it up to level. From everything I have learned, this is not good to do to the tree! She said that some trees are OK with this treatment, including this hickory. I did not think it would be good for any tree. With the slope, she will need to add about 3 feet of soil to the front of the tree. Your thoughts??? JP and this is our answer: We don't have personal experience with hickories' response to grade changes. We work with some hickories (pig nut and shag bark) that were affected decades ago when they were quite small but that's a different story.Their response back then would not make us confident today when they're huge, if we had to say yay or nay to soil being added. However, other species we know and have worked with in such situations, that do tolerate such change -- those are are all flood plain species. They're adapted to occasional deposits of soil, even agaisnt the trunk. Most elms. Silver maples, red maples, yellow birch, rvier birch, box elder, alder.... Hickory isn't a flood plain tree. It is a species that has roots that run a bit deeper than other species, and so can the tree often grow magnificently alongside a plowed field, for instance -- and maybe people might think it's had soil added because a tractor runs next to it regularly without the plow hitting anything. If the person you are working with has experience with hickories and garden change, we'd love to hear about it, specifics to add to the information we've amassed in our own work and gotten from others, such as city foresters and park managers. We value most the reports of those who do things to/see things done to trees and then are also there for years afterward to gauge the effects. You should ask this person to tell you where there is a hickory that's been treated this way, more than a year ago. Then go see it for yourself, talk to the owners about any changes in its condition. That would help you decide. That said, we never feel good about 3 feet of soil added around or on any tree unless it's a very small portion of the root system being covered and the soil's NOT against the trunk. We wish we could picture what exactly is being proposed for your tree -- could you send photos or the landscape plan drawing or both and we might be able to say more? Janet & Steven p.s. We would also like to put this on our Forum and ask if anyone who participates there has seen this done to or done this to a hickory. Once we post it there-- or you can go post it -- we or the Forum computer can let you know what replies come in. So does anyone out there have any experience hickories with this type of situation? We would like to hear form you and your experience good or bad.

Beaufort thanks for the "It's" help, I've been working on it. I'm sure the mistakes made you shutter all over.

I always try to carry my camera with me and sometimes it pays off in enabling me to see and tell some really cool stories with the photos more than the words. The following is just such a story. 8:13:13 pm I saw this egret while driving down a road, stopped and took this photo. I turned around to set the camera down and drive away, when I heard a loud splash... 8:13:56 pm Turned back, pointed the camera and started shooting as the egret ran to shore with its catch. 8:13:59 pm The egret shook off. 8:14:11 pm Then dropped the fish. By this time I was wondering why the bird hadn't just swallowed the fish like all the other egrets I've seen hunt and eat. 8:14:15 pm The egret then picked up the fish, a bullhead catfish, by its dorsal fin (the fin on top of the fish). Now I understand why it came to shore. This particular kind of catfish has sharp, stiff spines on its dorsal fin and on the pectoral fins. The pectoral fins are located just behind the gills and when the catfish stiffens up, the spines stick straight out and don't bend. These spines make it very difficult for the egret to swallow the fish without hurting itself. 8:14:23 pm The bird repeatedly shook the fish while holding on to the spine on the dorsal fin allowing the weight of the fish to help tear or break off the spine. How does this bird know to react this way to a particular fish? 8:14:36 pm The bird dropped the fish, picked it back up and shook it some more. 8:14:47 pm It then took the fish to the water and dipped it in. 8:14:55 pm Took the fish out and shook it some more. 8:16:27 pm Once the dorsal spine had been torn off, the egret began to work on the pectoral fins' stiff spines. It grabbed the fish by one the spines and shook it letting the weight of the fish help. 8:19:12 pm The same process, shake, rinse, shake, was repeated. 8:21:16 pm The egret tested if it could swallow the fish safely. 8:21:57 pm Taking the fish back out it would again shake it, drop it and pick it back up. 8:22:35 pm Giving the fish one last quick hard shake, 8:22:38 pm it flipped the fish head first into its mouth... 8:22:39 pm and swallowed. 8:22:44 pm Then got a drink, 8:22:46 pm swallowed, 8:23:02 pm and took another drink. This time a much deeper one. 8:23:15 pm Then, shuttered all over, 8:23:29 pm stretched the neck out as far as it would go, 8:23:38 pm took one last drink, 8:24:31 pm groomed the feathers, 8:24:38 pm and went back to hunting, appearing to be quite proud of itself.

Cool idea and photos!

Here's a photo of a Kildere bird acting hurt, and trying to lead me away from something in the following photos: Here's what the bird was trying to lead me a predator looking for easy prey away from: What an amazing camoflage job on those eggs. Nature has her ways.

The tri-color beech is perhaps my favorite tree. At least at this time and place it is. Here's one of my favorite tri-colors in it's full glory.

Close, the wrong end of a robin.

The first step we would take is remove all of the dead and damaged wood from the tree. Once the 'debris' is put of the way you can then assess them remaining tree. Are the damaged leaf twigs leaving out yet? Is the crown in good shape or will it need pruning to help it regain it's shape? It may just need a pruning for shape or it could require a major restructuring. If you feel you can't evaluate the tree properly consult a certified arborist in your area.