Will,
Your garden looks like a Garden of Eden. The red twig tree caught my eye. What is it? Gary

Red twig - let me guess..let me guess....Acer circinatum 'Pacific Fire'!?

If I got it right do I win a prise?! LOL!

Hah, close, kinda, depends on the picture. :)

The first image shows both. In the middle, and in all of the other images is Acer palmatum 'Sango Kaku'. At the lower right is the aforementioned 'Pacific Fire'.

K4, when are you going to post more images? I know you've been ordering plants all winter too, and our similar tastes in maples and conifers makes me wonder how your huge land(12 acres?) looks.

You created a garden. You deserve it. Sit back and relax and most of all enjoy it. When you feel like it, I recommend a pair of cowboy boots, a beer, some sort of pants, and a firemans helmet. Walk around and "soak" it all in.

It's all about getting plants in the ground. Nice job spark.

Dax

Nice job will...I suppose you think your nearing completion. I got news for you..it's never over. You just keep adding...replacing and moving. That's the nice thing about a dwarf conifer garden.

I had a Acer palmatum 'Sango Kaku'. It turned out to be one of the worst and most undesirable Acer palms I ever had. A trash tree that produced countless numbers of tiny dead twigs every year with out crops of uncontrollable growth shoots. Best thing I ever did was dig it up and throw it in the compost. The only desirable thing about it was the cool red bark.

Maybe I just had a misfit and yours will be fine.

Dave

lol Dave, I'll keep that in mind. The bark is nice and I'll enjoy the fall color but if it's unruly I'll give it the axe. Then I'll just have room for one of my many poor conifers in pots.

At least the baseline hard work is mostly done. We're lucky here in the NW to be able to do projects like this all winter.

Fire,

My 22 acres is not nearly as "mature" in its landscaping as yours! Still in the rough stages. There will be no hammock for me in the near future, I can assure you! This past week was spent cutting trees and clearing under-brush to make the space for planting beds, if that gives you a picture of where I am. I do have an island bed in the drive and the beds in front of the house that are relatively finished. And I have a 125ft long "woodland border" bed partially done. It needs rocks, conifers and companion plants to go along with the 20 or so maples I planted last fall. I have about 150 JMs and a dozen conifers left to plant (plus more on order), and all are waiting on the preparation of these beds. I got in three tandem-truck loads of top soil last week, and will probably need a Bobcat or a tractor with a bucket to move the stuff around. It's a HUGE amount of dirt! I figure when I've finished the 4 beds I've planned out with that dirt I should be able to plant maybe 40% of the remaining stock. Its going to take a while to get all of this done.

I'll post some pictures tomorrow...

Well K4, as glad as I am to be finished, I feel a tinge of jealousy at such a huge amount of land to 'sculpt'. Particularly for your Japanese maples where you can grow a lot of the larger uprights and not worry about their eventual size. Probably ridiculously, I have 1100 conifers and 190 maples planted on .6 acres. While most of the conifers are mini's and dwarves, and many of the JM's are dwarves, some of the maples will probably require frequent 'sculpting' to keep them on the property. It's going to feel semi-clausterphobic in 10 years. :)

Looking forward to your pics. I'd love to see your maples in leaf later this spring too, I'll have a lot of images to post - though not in this forum.

Will

Will,

I added some pics to the end of this slide show that may give you an idea of what I'm doing. Today was NOT a good day for photography!! Threatening thunderstorms and all... {{gwi:673574}}Sunstone Farm

Holy sh*t that's a LOT of areas already planned out for plantings. Your JM nursery is a *mirror* image of mine. I wonder how many cultivars we share. You must have access to a lot of heavy equipment - you certainly have a prime chunk of land and lots of work to do!

Makes my back hurt just looking at it!

More after pictures when you get projects completed!

Will

Will,

Yes, it is a lot of area and a lot of work, but since I love it its no big deal! That's half the fun of it!

And I have a brilliant idea - when plants out-grow YOUR garden, just dig them up and send them to MINE!! I'll even put a "memorial" marker on them, so they know where they came from. :-D

I'll be happy to send you my JM cultivar list, if you can get me your e-mail.

Here's my other little project.. ;-)
{{gwi:673576}}Grafting Japanese Maples

Will,

Every time when visiting the conifer forum I'll look at your pictures...again...with a loss of words to express the admiration and joy felt in watching your project evolve. In what seems a few short months, you have done what for many of us may be a lifetime of conifer collecting and landscaping. Thank you for letting us be a part of it! The walkway, the stream bed, the overall design, and especially the conifers, are all beautiful. Please continue posting pictures; you'll be able to show the good and bad in growth patterns, colors, hardiness, sun tolerance, ... of so many cultivars as they grow through the seasons.

Barbara

K4: GREAT little image sequence for would-be grafters. I'll save it for future reference. Perhaps some day we can trade scion or baby maples that one or the other of us doesn't have.

Barbara, it's words of encouragement and compliments like yours that makes every ache, pain and penny spent worthwhile. Hopefully down the road you can see it in person on an ACS tour 'van' of some sort. I'm a half hour from downtown Seattle and of course Coenosium Gardens is an hour from my place so that alone might make a trip worthy to some. I imagine down the road I can even load up cars and vans with extra potted conifers I have or *gasp* grafted beauties of my own and really spread the love around.

Sparky/Will lol

Will,

I can sent you some scion wood of Picea mariana 'Blue Tear Drop'. I know you expressed and interest in this cultivar.

See if Bob Fincham will graft for you. I'll send enough for both you and him if he's interested.

Dave

Hiya Dave,

I actually just ordered(and am *impatiently* awaiting) a young graft of 'Blue Tear Drop' from Darren of Whistling Gardens(Can.). It's my last 'big order' before I go into a shell of frugalness to pay off my Lowes project loan. I plan on posting a review of his nursery - one that I think will get very high reviews, based on price, size and rare treats he has available.

Your offer is greatly appreciated though. Hopefully we may share many grafts with eachother down the road.

Also, the next time I talk with Bob or visit Coenosiums I'll mention the 'Blue Tear Drop'. He may still be interested. I am hoping my property can act as a bit of a scion-wood grafting source for him and his many new offerings. I'd be honored to be providing people with fine baby grafts right out of my gardens.

Will

JUST ADMIT IT.. YOU ARE NO CLOSER TO THE HAMMOCK THAN YOU WERE WHEN YOU STARTED ....

your last post is my proof... you ordered more ..

and there is that whole pile of useless shrubs out front ...

ken

Hah Ken. Those will go slowly over the next year or three. The orders rolling in are all previously ordered, hold-til-spring kind of things. One from Cloud Mountain farms, one from Girards and one from Whistling gardens.

The front is going to be a lot of fun because there is already obsidian retaining walls with 2-3 levels all ready for medium sized conifers. Should form a natural 'rock garden'.

Fire,

Thanks man. By the way, I'll be traveling to Seattle in the next few weeks. Perhaps I could see the garden first hand? Shoot me an e-mail if you're interested (I think I enabled that feature)...

K4