I like to plant shade plants under my trees so the big mulch circle helps with that, and when they get bigger it looks more in proportion. Thanks for the compliments Ken. The Beech tree came from the woods near my house. If I remember right it has been in the ground for 7 years. It was about 3 ft tall when I planted it. I couldn't find it commercially. As for the trees being big, we have been getting lots of rain for the last 3 or 4 years. Famartin sorry to hear about what your parents did to the beech. My dad has limbed up spruces bashed into trees trunks in the past which lead to the demise ( I think) of a big Tulip tree. I cut the grass now. Most of the trees were small when planted, so the theory that small ones establish faster seems to be true.

I have a very tall podocarpus gracilior hedge around our pool on three sides which I affectionately refer to Hedgezilla. Yes, it can get big, but to keep it under control in a small, tight suburban setting as ours is, it becomes a maintenance nightmare which I've delegated to a very expensive tree-trimming company. Yes, this plant doesn't break or lift concrete or create oodles of litter, doesn't have thorns and is disease- and pest-free, and never needs water once established. (Ours has been in since the early 90s.) But, it's boring. Boring. BORING. Worst of all, it doesn't provide any wildlife benefits or visual interest. I hate it. It's the bane of my existence. I've decided to gradually replace it with a selection of plants that will be more natural looking, provide some wildlife benefits, and won't require a heavy-handed, man-made intervention on a regular basis.

I'm not familiar with 'Blue Hills,' and can't find any information on it. I've heard of 'Cheyenne,' 'Sioux Blue' and 'Indian Steel' as cultivars of Sorghastrum nutans. I haven't grown Sorghastrum, but comparing photos of it to Panicum virgatum 'Northwind' shows 'Northwind' to be far more upright in habit, and almost as blue in color as 'Sioux Blue.' I grow 'Northwind' and it's by far the most erect grass I've found. If you are going to plant a fairly large potted grass, and have at least 6-8 weeks before truly cold weather, you might get away with late summer planting. To be on the safe side, I'd wait for spring.

Snuffles, How's your longan doing now? The little plant there looks gorgeous--leaves are healthy and blooms fantastic. If you decide to keep the blooms, I hope you get some fruit forming for you. I would keep the blooms too .. just because blooms aren't always guaranteed year on year. Right now, I have got 3 juvenile longans growing in the ground. One of them actually isn't too juvenile. I got it 9 years ago when it was about 2-3 ft tall. So, it must be about more than 10 years old now. I planted it in the ground at first, but it kept getting sick with white flies. So, I dug it out again and nursed it to health. A couple of years back, I planted it back into the ground and since then it has grown to 8 ft tall with a lot more new leaves, but the white flies came back to attack it. Now that it's bigger, I think it's also more hardy to withstand the white flies attack. I used to clean the sticky stuff off the leaves, but now that it's bigger, it's hard to do that. Anyway, here's a picture of it bearing some fruit now: Longan Kohala at 8 ft now: close up of the little fruit formation: The second longan I have is a Biew Kiew (slightly more than 5 ft tall). I'm guessing the age is less 5-7 years. It was blooming last year, but I got no fruit from it. This year, no sign of any blooms. Longans have a habit of growing long floppy limps. I just chopped off two of the lanky limps in the middle. If you look closely, you'll see the old dark green leaves beneath the new flushes that shot up. Here's a third longan which is also a Biew Kiew. It's a little over 5 ft too. No blooms this year. The problem I noticed a while ago was this tree was in a "frozen" state, meaning the little budding shoots from last year got dried out. I was waiting to see if they would grow, but they never did, so I decided to rub them off the branches. A few weeks later, I saw lots of new flushes coming up. So, I did learn something new. I was having so much troubles with my lychees and decided to pay more attention to my longans to see if they will perform better for me. At least, with the lychees, they are pretty pest free except for web worms ... which unfortunately is prevalent when there are mature hard wood trees around. Oh yeah, we have some humongous Oak trees around here ... lol. I hope you enjoy your little longan tree now and hope it'll do well for you in the years to come.