You post your message, add the picture then hit preview to make it show up. It will not show up til then. Are you using photobucket.com? That seems to be the easiest.

Aw, thanks for the welcome. I can't wait to post more pictures, once I get more blooms. I really enjoy seeing everyone's beautiful flowers. Since I am a newbie to daylilies, this year I stuck to buying older, inexpensive varieties - so I hope that I don't bore anyone with my obscure flowers. It is just such a pleasure to find people who "get it" and can appreciate my flower obsession. My garden is planted in a community garden, and the vast majority of people plant only vegetables/herbs. I know that some of them think I am crazy for planting only flowers, but I tell them that I help to attract tons of bees and butterflies to pollinate their crops!

Given your location, it seems the maple should do quite well but the plumeria will need to be brought in for winter :-) There is often a lot of misinformation about the correct naming of Japanese maples. All named forms - cultivars - of Japanese maples are propagated asexually, either by grafting (most common) or by cuttings (less common). All seed grown Japanese maples are just referred to as generic Acer palmatum - no cultivar name - regardless of what the parent plant was. Cultivar names are registered and all reputable growers will propagate correctly with the approved and correctly labeled stock plants. But there are many less reputable sources that will produce maples under other, non-registered names or even by seed. 'Bloodgood is perhaps the most widely propagated Japanese maple on the market and you will often find seed-grown so-called Bloodgoods on the market. They may very well look like Bloodgood but they are not. You may find "dwarf" Bloodgoods included in this somewhat suspicious grouping. Bloodgood is a pretty good sized JM. The typical mature size is often quoted as 20'x20' but Vertrees (THE JM authority) reports a mature height of upto 30 feet. As I stated previously, there is NO dwarf Bloodgood but a good number of smaller growing Bloodgood look-alikes, several of which were sports or brooms from a known Bloodgood. But they are known by different names if properly registered cultivars. Enjoy whatever tree you actually have :-)) I've yet to meet any Japanese maple I didn't like!

I could be wrong about the zone - on a zip code lookup map it tells me 9-10. I am near the coast, and the weather here tends to be much more mild. Those "zones" are pretty broad classifications. Here's a fairly accurate description of where I live: "Salinas, CA climate is mild during summer when temperatures tend to be in the 60's and cool during winter when temperatures tend to be in the 50's. The warmest month of the year is September with an average maximum temperature of 74.60 degrees Fahrenheit, while the coldest month of the year is December with an average minimum temperature of 39.40 degrees Fahrenheit. Temperature variations between night and day tend to be fairly limited during summer with a difference that can reach 19 degrees Fahrenheit, and moderate during winter with an average difference of 22 degrees Fahrenheit. The annual average precipitation at Salinas is 15.12 Inches. Rainfall in is fairly evenly distributed throughout the year. The wettest month of the year is January with an average rainfall of 3.00 Inches." We do get some 90 degree days, but only a handful. I had read the FAQ about blossom drop. . .I don't think too hot is going to be my biggest problem. My neighbor (who's in something like his 60th year of planting tomatoes in his backyard across the street - he's 92) said he usually doesn't even plant until around May 1 because it's not warm enough to really get 'em growing; in his words, "they just sit there and look at ya." Maybe I'm misunderstanding the term "frost date." Is it a technical term, or just the last time that you wake up to frozen stuff around you? Stupid question, I know, but I have a feeling I'm not communicating something correctly. Yes, the plants get direct sun for at least 6-8 hours a day (I need to be a little more scientific about it), but it's been a cold spring - it's been in the 50's all this last week with a high of 63 projected for the next week. On the few hot days we have had, the plants have practically grown before my eyes, but they don't grow much during these chilly times. So. . .I can put in a stake without messing up their little root systems? Thanks, Christopher