patlovesdirt, Yes your maple will be far better off without the MG soil. As Al mentioned, you should look at the "gritty mix" for growing trees. Basically it's a combination of pine bark, granite and turface. Those three ingredients (or appropriate substitutes) make an incredible container soil for trees and shrubs. Any woody plant will love the gritty mix. You can also adjust the mixture depending on what type of plant or tree you're growing and your local growing environment. I have about a dozen conifer trees, ranging in size from tiny first-year seedlings to 4 year old saplings, and all are growing in some variant of the gritty mix soil. All are doing very well, and root growth is spectacular in the grit mix. Once you try the gritty mix for your woody plants and see the results you will *never* go back to that bagged MG soil again. HTH Dave

Dogwood, Cornus florida.

Thousands of little plants from this whatever name it goes by. I am now thinking it is Siberian elm that we have, rather than Chinese, as we always cursedly call it. I just went out to look at the bark of one I have and it certainly resembles the Siberian pictured above. I've been going to get rid of it anyway, but procrastination set in.

Thank you so much for your responses, I am now sure it is a type of Ligustrum and that is good enough for me! I have alot of work ahead of me with the garden, I feel previous owners have gone to the local garden centre and asked for "one of everything"!