Everyone here has you covered as far as orchids are concerned. I happen to appreciate the charm and funkiness of CalOrchid. Great, down to earth owners; very knowledgeable and unusual plants. Great angracoids. In Carmel, there is a shop in the Barnyard called Succulent Gardens. Great eye candy, and prices to match. A bit further north along Hwy.1 in the little town of Elkhorn (just inland from Moss Landing) is their actual nursery. I think plant prices there are more reasonable; although I haven't made it there yet. I have purchased succulents from them at the San Fran Flower and Garden Show, as well as a local Cactus and Succulent Society show. Great plants! Have fun! Lori

Kristine, Palm Desert counts! I heard they had a club there too but I'm still trying to find out more info on the club. Do you know what kind of plumeria they have? It's too late for this year but I;m sure well be going there next summer on our way to California. Mickey

powermuffin, we're almost neighbors! I live south of Longmont, but used to practice yoga at the studio on Tenacity Drive, and dated a guy who lived on Gay Street (some 16 years ago). He said the street name did give him pause when he bought the house, and though he managed to get over it enough to live there, like your husband he was quick to "explain" the name when giving out his address. My childhood home was on Walden Road, so no street I've lived on since has had a name that's half as idyllic. The streets in our current neighborhood are mostly last names, which is boring, but better than cutesie or pretentious I suppose.

Thanks both of you. I was starting to get that weird feeling like somehow, I woke up on the wrong planet today! I should say too that little villages and dinkier cities here too often have minimal or no program. But in the medium-sized city I happen to live in and work for, a very comprehensive urban forestry program has been in place since the 1950s. And this is not at all an exception to the rule. Another key piece of the puzzle is that the community-whatever its size-have a tree ordinance of some kind. In my community again, we have such an ordinance, which means, among other things, that when Asplundh or whomever does their contractual work for the power company, at least they have to make target pruning cuts, not just random heading back cuts at exactly 6 or 10 feet or whatever requirement that size or voltage line is assigned. Still not perfect, but all one need do is cross the line into one of the suburban and less regulated communities to see the difference in treatment the trees get. So back to the meat of this thread: Where overhead lines are not present, street trees "should" be tall-growing types. Shade is one key function, as are the multiple benefits I list above. Small-to-mature ornamental species will never satisfy these requirements-they simply don't get large enough. Further-and I say this all the time-their crowns (of small, ornamental species) occupy the same real estate that we do, low to the ground, right where we walk or ride our bikes, right where our garbage trucks drive, etc. so that there's really no space for the tree to exist. Not saying we have none of this feature. I'm afraid my colleague the City Forester bought into the downsizing of the urban forest along with the rest of the nation when working under power lines, and maybe there's no avoiding it. I'd rather we planted full-size stuff there too, but via pruning, pre-valley them out so that at least we had actual shade-producing trees there, but that ain't happening, so I move on. But where overhead space is not restricted, it's an awful waste to plant some dinky thing. +oM