Depends on what kind of dendrobium you have. Nobile (which loses its leaves and needs a cool dry dormant period) or a phaleanopsis type dendrobe, which keeps its leaves all year on its cane. Nobile type dendrobes don't have "spikes" and bloom from new matured canes with very short racemes. A phalie type has has a "spike" from the axil of the top of the leaf/cane. After blooming, remove this completely since it will never bloom off of an old spike. Phalie type dendrobes need bright light and intermediate temps. Like cattleyas. There is no "winter mode" for them. They don't go into dormancy like nobile types. If you have any kind of freezing or frost, you might have a problem since phalie type dendrobes are not cold hardy. The plant would need protection. Only South Florida seems to be able to keep their plants outside year-round with no protection. Just a shade house. Northern Florida and even central Florida gets frost and freezing in the winter.

I did take your advice and emailed our designer asking for rhody alternatives, but I haven't heard back from her yet. I just thought folks here might be more familiar (than I am) with shrubs of similar size that work well in Seattle in a sunny front yard, so that I could avoid some back and forth with the designer--give her some direction as to stuff we do like. I won't scan in the plan, but here is the complete list of proposed trees/plants/shrubs/grouncover with quantities, which may be helpful. Common Name No. TREES: Bloodgood Japanese Maple 4 (going in parking strip) Coralbark Maple 1 Slender Hinoki Cypress 3 Tall Stewartia 2 SHRUBS: Yuletide Winter Camelliaq 4 Golden Mexican Orange 7 Variegated Redtwig Dogwood 4 Carol Mackie Daphne 3 Tricolor Hebe 9 med green/red flax (Phormium tenax 'Amazing Red') 3 Dwarf Lily of the Valley Shrub 18 Dwarf Red reblooming Rhodie 14 Dwarf White Rhododendron 10 Rosemary 3 Perennials, Grasses, Groundcovers: Feather Grass 17 Dwarf Brass Buttons 198 Barrenwart, asst. colors 25 Lenten Rose, Christmas Rose 21 Yellow flowering winter rose 12 PER: Yellow/Burgundy Daylily 9 Sum & Substance Plantain Lily 7 Big Blue Lily Turf 65 Black Mondo Grass 90 Sky Blue Passionflower 2 Evergreen Chartreuse 'Moss' 144 The house is raised above street level, and we have a acid stained (copper brown color) concrete retaining walls at 2 levels with a planing beds on each level then the main front yard, where much of the larger plants/shrubs will be. The Bloodgood maples will be in our parking strip. I hope this helps! Thank you, Deb

Can you post a picture of the whole bed? I'm curious about the black tarp around the plant. Is it around all of your plants? In this picture it looks like the tarp is slanting slightly inward toward the base of the plant, maybe creating an area of pooled water against the stem? If so, and you have had a lot of rain and not great drainage, it could have weakened the lower stem causing it to fall over. Just an idea.

There are smaller weigelas than wine and roses. I need to trim our wine and roses back. We have some variegated weigela (can't remember the name) that are taller than the max listed in just a couple of years and we need to keep cutting them back. I also have some My Monet. A few get more shade and aren't doing as well but the ones that get a lot of sun look fantastic. I am replacing barberries with weigelas in many places due to the thorns. Our dog likes to get near these and we are afraid he will get scratched. Other than that we only deal with the thorns when pruning. I am in zone 5 and all my weigelas are doing great.