Sandy, regarding the holy&berries, its usually not only spraying, but a whole set of things in the city environment. Most plants which are not self pollinating, need pollinators. However, in the city environment bees often are exterminated as a pest if the swarm happens to land somewhere by chance, also people tend to destroy bee nests if they find them somewhere in their property, instead of calling a bee keeper so safely remove it. Also usually there are not that many bee keepers close to the city, so no honey bees in flying distance from the city. In the city bumble bees are important pollinator, but again, in the urban gardens they lack habitat and food to really thrive (especially since bumble bees rarely make nest in same location next year). Even those few flowering weeds that somehow manage to appear in the lawns, tend to be herbicided and weeded out fairly quickly. Lawns, paved gardens, flower-less ornamental plants, all of that make any sane bee (or any other nectar feeding insect) to fly the other direction. Nectar feeding insects need continuous supply of it from different plants for the variety of diet, so you have to have something different blooming at any day of the season to really feed them well. In bee opinion wild flower mix seeds for 2$ are way better choice than roses and other fancy, but low on nectar plants for 200$. Also, in some climates bumble-bees are even more important pollinator, because they fly in more cold and wet conditions than the regular honey bees (or any other pollinator, due to their fur). Hence if you have an orchard and very cold wet weather when your orchard is blooming, you rely solely on bumble bees to pollinate it. Bumble bees in their turn need fallen tree logs, meadows, turfs or even just clumps of dried grass to establish their hives, so heavy cultivation and even tidy rose gardens are not really good for them. Also, many birds and insects like to use second hand nests for themselves, for example bumble bees like to use old mouse nests for their nests, so if the mouse population is exterminated aggressively, that also influences the well being of the bumble bees. It is possible to provide special hives for bumble bees though, but again, not everyone likes a bumble bee hive in their garden.

the flower from rose of sharon is beautiful but my neighbor Monique is lazy and does not dead head hers, it spreads everywhere even her own lawn has about 900 seedlings in that area,and they do not care. They are inconsiderate. I had to pull 275 shoots from my grass and now they planted them along the fenceline...I'm sure i will have at least 700 to pull next season. Nothing you spray on them make them die..The seedpods are still there from last year and they dont trim them either. They also have a birch tree that spews seed pods for months clogging my pool, gutters, and branches fall continuously all season long from those trees.I have pulled tons of seedling trees from that as well in my landscape, very invasive! If it was the other way around she would be going ballistic! May the wind blow their way and have them have to clean up after their own problems. Plenty of other plants to plant but they are wealthy and very very cheap.

I have been enjoying everyones gorgeous gardens and fabulous flower pictures. We finally have warm weather here in Wisconsin. Tulips, daffodills and other early spring flowers have come and gone. Roses,peonies and others are not blooming yet.My flowering trees were a week to 10 days later than normal but as you can see by this one. It was worth the wait.

This thread prompted me to pay my tree a visit. Confirmed at about 20' tall with a 6' spread. It's just starting to push some fresh growth. This is what I was talking about with the rooted branches. I took out around 20 of them, but kept a few because I think they're cool and represent the species. But of course, nothing beats the cultivar, 'Nana' if you have a small landscape. This one is about 10 years old, about a foot tall and 3 feet wide. It's noteworthy that when growing at high altitude, this species grows as more of a shrub form.