shadyindylady, It would be a tough pick to say which conifer is my favorite.I have about 200. Compared to some of the conifer enthusiasts I'm just a beginner though. How much space do you have for this conifer? Do you like green,blue, gold or variegated foliage or are you looking for a spring show that will serve as a backdrop for the rest of the year? Or do you want it to have impressive cones? I get alot of my conifers mail order. (check out Ceonosium Gardens, Porterhouse Nursery, Gee Nursery to name a few). Locally I've aquired quite a few plants from Rich's Foxwillow Pines in Woodstock Illinois. I'd check out every local nursery in your area though and see what they have. Chances are if they carry plants from Iseli Nursery they'll have a couple of cool things. They are a wholesale nursery that supply a lot of local nuseries. Their 2005 catalog is online with alot of pictures to give you some ideas. Hope this helps. If you give me some more specifics I'll do my best to give you some recommendations. Thanks for the compliments and glad you liked the photos. Dan

Does anyone have suggestions where I can find a good online seed source for abies concolor (white fir) 'Candicans'?

Spring is ideal but early fall is fine too. The trick is to ensure its well watered prior to the first freeze. Abies DEMANDS well drained soil. They can really struggle in wet soils when the snow melts if its not draining well. This is the very reason you will "rarely" see this plant growing in clay soils successfully. I learned the hard way that as a species there are seed variants (hopefully that is the right terminalogy) and therefore there are various shades of blue, silver and green. My neighbor has one that is turqouise and mine are green. I bought them in March and asked why the plant looked so green and he said it will be blue when it flushes...not what a lieing jag off. Obviously you'd have more control with selected cutlivars. Avoid 'Candicans'. It has awesome cones and needle color but they are very thin, gangly looking plants. Its been consistent in the ones I've seen in person. My neighbors plant. Congrats on your first potential conifer. Be sure to venture over to that forum.

Unfortunately in our area this tree gets ugly on the inside, as do blue Colorado spruce and blue Rocky Mountain juniper cultivars. More specifically, the fir goes bald, the spruces lose needles to bugs and grow algae, and the junipers grow algae - we are not able to maintain the spectacular appearance these trees produce east of the mountains. Our region does have a few older blue forms of Juniperus virginiana that are attractive. This is of course a moist climate adapted species, unlike the other three. But also unlike the fir etc. you typically can't walk into a retail garden center here and find any of these for sale now.