Interesting topic. I live in the country (in Tennessee - so this is a Southern story), so I don't have neighbors to fight with on this issue, but I do know a little about trees and the health of forrests. On my own property, I am preparing for some selctive logging and thinning of the forrest. This is necessary because the old growth in some spots has gotten to the point of causing a DECLINE in bio-diversity. When you get trees that are 100+ feet in height, they can shade out just about anything else underneath. So shade-tolerant species are the only ones that can grow under the canopy, and they eventually create somewhat of a monoculture in the forrest. When the large canopy trees do die - as they all will - what's left are the shade-tolerant trees, and they prevent the next generation of hardwoods from growing. So eventually you loose the majestic Oaks, Hickories, etc. and are left with little more than Beech, Ironwood and Maple. These trees are not as good for the ecology, and don't provide much food for wildlife. Oaks and Hickories are the back-bone of the forrest, providing the lion's share of the food crops. An Oak tree also processes twice as much CO2 as a comparably sized Maple. But their seedlings are shade-intolerant. The Oaks will not grow back if the forrest is shady. So, if we never thin the forrest, and insist on preserving all the mature trees, the richness of our ecology declines. The forrest supports fewer species, and weedy species gradually become dominant. We have eliminated much of the natural "turnover" that occurred in the forrest, especially wildfires. We put them out with a vengence! Yet these acts of nature are crucial to clearning areas where Oaks and Hickories can sprout and thrive in the sun. The Forrestry service did a survey of my land for me and recommended selective thinning to allow a greater diversity of species to grow here. I'm negotiating with loggers who use low-impact logging techniques, such as the use of mules to haul out the logs, so as to minimize the impact on the land. No one loves trees more than I do, but we all need to realize we have a responsibility to manage the forrest, just as we would any garden. It IS a garden - just a garden of giant plants! Diversity and renewal are an essential part of any healthy ecology. I think those principles extend to urban neighborhoods and back yards too. :-) K4

I sure hope they did, although the Botanic Gardens aren't close to downtown. Millennium Park has some very nice plantings too. Boy these boards are slow lately!

Love squash, all types. I have 8 squash sitting on my kitchen counter now, 4 different types. So much cheaper to buy at the farm stands than at a grocery store where they sell by the pound. 99 cents for a butternut squash is much better than paying over $1 a pound. A good improvement for pumpkin pie is a splash of rum or as my friend just used a splash of vodka in her pie filling. Costco was selling their huge pumpkin pies for $5.95 last week for our Thanksgiving. I bought one and shared it with the neighbours. I bake my squash most of the time cut in half in the oven with butter and brown sugar, microwave whole and mash it with cinnamon or chili powder. Spaghetti squash just butter and pepper or a sprinkle of fresh grated parm or romano cheese. Love squash soup.

Thanks re the ID of the cleome. I don't grow annuals so am not familiar with most of them. I did a Google search on 'annual flower thorny stems' and cleome did come up but I couldn't seem to find a picture of the foliage to confirm that it matched.... I had heard that they seed around a lot so I'll warn them about that. re the slope/lower garden - the topography of the property and area is complicated and confusing! The house sits lower than the street and the driveway is sort of a ramp off the street and runs close to their front porch - there is no front garden - there isn't even room for a 'necklace' of green' like we have between the driveway and front porch. The lot slopes from the front of the house to the back - but not to the extent of producing a walk-out basement. The lower garden is naturally lower than the rest and the step down was there when they bought the property. The land behind the fence appears to be higher ground. So they seem to be sitting in a bowl - but there doesn't seem to be water retention problems so I assume that the land continues to drop off somewhere beyond the lower garden. The seating patio in the corner is just steps from the stairs down from the deck. It's a nice place for morning coffee and afternoon and evening relaxing. The outdoor dining table is on the deck. The hanging baskets someone commented on in the second picture above are hanging off the deck. The compost are is - and needs to be - attractive because it is across from the end of the stair from the deck! I took that picture looking down from the deck while standing near the stairs.... The garden space is both attractive, functional and used efficiently.