any reason you are ruling out the Abies concolor and Abies balsemea ???

or Pinus flexilus???

of even the blue doug firs ... crikey blanking on latin ... lol .. they were totally bulletproof this last horrible winter in my z5 ... ah.. psuedotsuga something or another.. lol .. well half came back ... and switching over to google is just too overwhelming right now ...

ken

Abies concolor is a possibility and I never even thought about a douglas fir. We do have lots of deer so the Abies would need fenced not sure if the douglas would need to be. Do Pinus flexilus do well in central IL? Thanks for your input, Ken.

i dont know central IL ...

maybe dax would know ...

ken

If you want the best engelmannii around, I would place an order with Bob Fincham over at Coenosium nurseries for there fall shipment of Picea engelmannii 'Blue Angel'... It's an incredible blue and I believe can only be obtained from Bob at this point.

Coenosium - Fall 2014

Thanks for the link, SC. Might have to get 'Blue Angel' and Abies concolor 'Blue Cloak'.

No problem. Those are two exceptional conifers. I got 'Blue Cloak' this past spring from Conifer Kingdom and was very pleased with the color.

Another nice blue to consider is Abies lasiocarpa 'Glauca Compacta'

Try Abies pinsapo 'Glauca' and/or Cedrus atlantica 'Glauca' for a healthy blue color.

Abies lasiocarpa 'Glauca Compacta' is one of my most stunning plants..

at 12 + years ... is barely 5 feet tall ...

ken

Blue Angel is one of the best 'hidden secrets'. Bob brought scions from England at Adrian Bloom's garden to the USA. I have 2 grafts of it from Coenosium.

Pinus flexilis-reflexa is not a good species for long-term for humid climates. They'll get needlecast diseases. I wrote reflexa because all the supposed flexilis cultivars have been disproven from cone ID and are reflexa.

Dax

This is a photo of a third graft I purchased from Bob that I gifted to a friend... his soil is much better than my own & my plants are 1/2 this size (and a link to Bob's plant.)

Dax

Here is a link that might be useful: Blue Angel at Coenosium

Thanks, Dax, I thought you had mentioned awhile back that Pinus flexilis wasn't a good choice for humid climates. That's a great picture of Blue Angel!

Dax, your right! It was some of your old posts that got me trying to track down this cultivar. I searched high and low to find it, but it had a typo on Bob's website, so I only ever found a few international examples of it. Basically gave up hope of acquiring it until recently David Resavage posted this insane photo of his 8yr old 'Blue Angel' and let me know Bob had it for sale this fall...

Needless to say, I re-arranged my ordering plans and send Bob a request for one!

Full credit on this photo goes to David Resavage (originally posted on facebook), but I wanted to share this image will everyone to show how exceptional this cultivar is.

Anyone have any additional details on growth rates? At 8 years, it seems to be much slower growth than 'Bush's Lace'.

That's the one :-) . I'm placing a order. Hopefully, there's one with my name on it! Thanks for everyone's help.