I live in a coastal area where we have regular Nor-Southerlies(!) My garden is basically surrounded by windbreak cloth: I recommend black. While green sounds less intrusive, it looks hideous. Also go for the pricier, yet infinitely sturdier, knitted rather than woven, if finances allow. It all actually looks quite ok: I've attached the cloth to 'warratahs', AKA 'star pickets' AKA who knows, up your way? It's generally recommended to go for 50% permeability rather than a solid wall, to minimise turbulence. It's made a BIG difference.

I have a story to tell...our community garden became the war trophy... A community garden became the dream of a single living in public housing in Elsternwick...Elsternwick is a leafy beachside suburb 15 Km's from Melbourne, Victoria , Australia. At that time (4 years ago) Public housing tenants were really feeling the brunt of the fascist/econimc rationalist/capitalist Kennet governement (state). For the first time ever Kennett raised the public housing rents and took away security of life long tenure. Kennett spent nothing on the exsisting stock...reduced spending and was repremanded by our Commonwealth Governemnt for not using the money it had given Kennett for public housing.... Although things were tough, We have a singer/poet called Paul Kelly here who sang a song called...from little things big things grow...it is about the land rights struggle of our Aboriginal brothers and sisters....but we too were stolen, degraded, lacked status, broad based education and monetry wealth and had been left to rot...some of us feared we were becoming the women of the Victorian ghetto's in london... So...with inspiration...Vanessa started lobbying, gathering, and working towards permission to build a garden in the common areas of the public housing landscape...I suppose they thought "its just a bit of dirt and seed...what can come of it?" They eventually said yes....the garden now covers 30% of the landscape...has no fences...some self seeding happens... there are tools, resources, knowledge and friendship to be found there...and if you want to be involved in the political...(the personal being totally political) you meet in the garden...the gardners are multicultural and multi talented...its a joy to see so many styles of gardening in one place...ever one seems to be working... There were many plans that grew from the garden...the garden had always been simply a conduit for communication, breaking down barriers, inproving self worth/opnion/esteem/power. The garden recognised the beauty and talent of the peopele who had little economic status and sought to build them up. It began to lobby for a community room...somewhere to work, have a phone, get serious about self sustainability (we all know the dangers of rely on government funding dont we?. Classes were planned, new garden beds, a sensory garden, childrens groups were run, holiday programs, a community market, partnerships were developed with the wider community, land reclamation was planned and Rainbow Enterprises sought to be an economic outlet, selling handmade wares and delivering small business idea and education to tenants....all for free...all built by the free labours of women.... the guerrilla girls grew out of the Garden Committee...their work saw them to make public protest on housing issues, they dumped a broken down car outside the Port Melbourne Town Hall ...the car was painted with "emergency housing unit 13" and signs were put along the road to highlight the...

Euphorbias seem to make a nice hedge/screen. I have red euphorbias that are about 6-7' tall right now, and they have beautiful red foliage year-round, but they don't fill in super full. Maybe I'm just not pruning them harshly enough though. I have a neighbor who butchers hers every few months and they always come back like gangbusters! I also have a hedge of Mexican pointsettia. I haven't been able to find out the official name of this plant. None of the pictures that come up on the web show what this plant is, but that is what it is called in all the nursuries I have seen it in here. It has small leaves, about 1 1/2" X 1/4", but it fills out nicely, better than the red euphorbia for a screen. In the winter (about November-February), the leaves all turn white, and it has a very delicate smell that is reminiscent of almond-flavored things. I have had my plants in the ground for about a year, and they are about 4' tall. I don't know if they are going to get much taller or not. If you look in the nurseries now, you could probably still find these with some of their white leaves. We are about 1/4-1/3 mile away from the ocean, so we get a little salt spray but nothing extreme. I'm sure a good nursery would be able to tell you about the salt tolerance. Both plants seem pretty drought-resistant, and I haven't had any trouble with bugs on the red euphorbias. The Mexican poinsettias do attract whitefly, but it doesn't seem to cause any real problems. Happy gardening!

beachlily, Pat did warn against using too high a concentration for foliar spray. He said it will turn the foliage white and shortly afterward it will die. Thanks lalalandwi for the article, I had not seen it before. From the article, I think K-Phite would be better used against rot. Nancy does use Nickel Plus, and it is being touted as a very good rust preventative, especially when used with a systemic fungicide. Dan Trimmer recently spoke to our club and he is using Nickel Plus in combination with Cabrio EG. Then rotating with Bayleton 50 and Nickel Plus. He said he is able to reduce his spraying to monthly, even during rust season and it is very effective. I have ordered some Nickel Plus. I currently use Cabrio EG and rotate Bayleton 50, each time mixed with a water conditioner and Contact fungicide. I looked up Clevis. Myclobutanil (Eagle), is the systemic fungicide in Clevis. Myclobutanil has not proved very effective against daylily rust. However, the contact in this mixture, mancozeb with zinc is a very good contact fungicide. It's also a point of argument as to whether the products touted to prevent disease by improving immune systems are effective against daylily rust. Rust is a parasite, not a disease and prefers vigorous, growing plants to feed on. I think that may be why it is most active during the high growth periods of daylilies. Ed