Phil, the area in northern california that i am referring to is the area from red bluff to sacramento and is listed in the sunset "western garden book" as their zones 8,9, and 14 which is ROUGHLY equal to USDA 9a and 9b. summers are indeed hot and dry (essentially no rainfall from mid may to late october/early november). winters are normaly mild with relatively few "hard" frosts (below 28f/-2c)but it can get significantly colder occassionally and this winter things got that way for several consecutive days in early december with temps to -8c or lower ending up with severe frond damage on mature trees of washingtonia robusta in certain areas and more to the point severe damage to g. robusta which had previously been doing well for years---there were 30'/9m tall g. robusta plants in one area and even fairly large red gums in some areas had complete foliage burn---dont know what the long term effects may be on the silky oak but would guess that the gums will recover fairly handily. agree that there is a fairly good chance that we will never learn more about the area we were attempting to suggest appropriate plants for but we at least had a nice "chat". BTW, the photos you post on this and various other plant websites are always interesting---please keep them coming.

It's difficult for me to think of containers as needing less maintenance. I guess if you don't have a couple thousand of them then perhaps it could be true. But once you put something drought tolerant in the ground it really doesn't need any care after that... the only real hassle (unless it's larger shrubs/trees) is weeding. As far as tropicals... to me a lot of the lush and leafy stuff is a waste of time, espcially things like Cannas and bananas. They seem to demand a lot of water and fertilizer and even then sometimes fail to perform well in cooler summers. It's the drought tolerant exotic plants - not really tropicals - that I continue to appreciate and grow. I'm not quite done with this - it needs a little revision - but here's how my old garden looks after 12 degrees last winter. http://www.desertnorthwest.com/articles/freeze_08_10.html Getting back to the weather, I thought I'd pass along this splendid bit of information... Public Information Statement Statement as of 4:00 am PDT on November 4, 2010 ... Record for all time warmest November day in Seattle tied on Wednesday... The high temperature of 74 degrees on Wednesday tied for the warmest all time November day on record in Seattle. The other November 74 degree day was on November 4th 1949. Wednesday was only the fifth day ... including records at the federal building which go back to 1891... where the high reached into the 70s in November. The following is a summary of 70 degree days in November in Seattle. 1. 74 degrees 11/3/2010 2. 74 degrees 11/4/1949 3. 72 degrees 11/2/1970 federal building high was 72 4. 71 degrees 11/4/1980 5. 70 degrees 11/3/1970 federal building high was 73 When the federal building was the official weather record site for Seattle... 1891 to 1944... there was never a day in November with a high in the 70s. This past Summer... June 21st to September 21st... the high temperature at Seattle-Tacoma Airport was less than 74 degrees on 60 out of the 93 days... so almost two thirds of the days this Summer were not as warm as Wednesday. Out of the four years where a 70 degree day has occurred in Seattle in November three of the years... 2010... 1970 and 1949 are La Nina years. 1980 was a neutral year. It is interesting to note that the previous 74 degree day in 1949 was during a moderate to strong La Nina event. A moderate to strong La Nina event is predicted for this winter season. The 74 degree day in November 1949 was followed over two months later by the coldest month on record in Seattle... January 1950 where the average monthly temperature was 24.9 degrees ( 16 degrees below the current normal of 40.9 degrees ) and when the all time record low temperature was recorded ( January 31 1950 0 degrees ).

Hi. I'm glad to hear your plants are doing well, but I'm also afraid of the potential they have to become invasive--especially the C. mexicana which spreads easily from seed in gardens here in Tucson. Please keep an eye on that and if the seeds of these spp. start sprouting in your yard and neighbours' places, get rid of them. Oz already has a problem with some US leguminous plants like Parkinsonia, Prosopis and others. You wouldn't want to have a plant named after you like the weed Patterson's Curse! I'm a bit concerned here about some of the Australian senna and acacia species getting loose. Senna sets a lot of seeds here and spreads easily. I think it's just a matter of time before it's a big problem. That said, I'm a big fan of Oz species and started my horticultural career in Perth. I'd love to try some of the odd spp. from central NSW and the other dry areas of the country like a bunch of the emu bushes, some of the arid zone eucs, and odd hakeas. Some of them are in Plants of Western NSW by Cunningham et. al., and if you don't have that book, you should get it! Take care and good luck with your trees. Greg

Not sure but that leaf style can handle frosts. Similar leaf to fireworks / firecracker but no yellow with the red on the flower so it is not one of those two.