I'm located in north/central MN, probably having climate conditions like you do. You need to give blueberries a try. I went to a lot of extra work initially to plant them, but I needed to because of the soil here. The top soil here was only about 7 inches deep so I turned this top soil off to the side. The next 6" of sand was removed, hauled away, and replaced with damp spagnum peat moss and aged sawdust. I mixed everything (topsoil,peatmoss & sawdust) with a rototiller as I gradually backfilled the furrow. I had 2 furrows that were 30" wide by 60 ft long each. A 2 bottom plow can help a lot with this. The majority of the plants that I put in were half-highs and spaced 4 ft apart in 2 rows 8 ft apart. 25 of the half-highs are Chippewa, Polaris, and StCloud. Two other half-highs that I'm going to try next year are Superior and Friendship. All of these are available from St.Lawrence Nurseries in Potsdam, N.Y. I also have 4 Bluecrop plants that are taller and so far they haven't been winter damaged but that may be because last winter wasn't brutal. There are also 6 mystery blueberry plants that were moved from other locations. My current Apples are Haralson, Honey Crisp, and Zestar. 52 ft row of Boyne, and 52 ft. row of Autumn Britten raspberries. SLN has a black raspberry that was bred 20 miles from here in Pequot Lakes, MN. Winter hardy here. Name = "Pequot Black Raspberry" This will be added next spring too. Other "To be Added" are: Nova Pear, Bali Sour Cherry, and King of the North Grape.

My experience with dogwoods - C.mas, I've only sampled unnamed seedlings - fruits are very tart & astringent until 'dead ripe' - I like 'em, but many folks don't; C.kousa - the ripe fruits contain a pleasant-tasting, somewhat grainy pulp, with a flavor reminiscent of pawpaw(to me, anyway). I've not had many folks I've shared kousa fruits with who really liked them - but most don't care for pawpaws or persimmons, either. Mulberries - hard to beat Illinois Everbearing, though I don't know for sure how it performs in the PNW - long bearing season(early June-late July, here), large berries with great flavor & sweet/tart balance. Collier & Stearns are also very good producers with good flavor; I've been disappointed with Wellington. Pakistan, Shangri-La, and some of the other large-fruited M.alba selections might also work well for you in a zone 8 setting.

Bob, the email address you listed is not valid. Just sent them an email and it got bounced back to me with the following info: Your message To: gwfeedback@mail.ivillage.com Subject: FAQ Info for Forums Sent: Sun, 23 Sep 2007 08:36:38 -0700 did not reach the following recipient(s): IVILLAGEGWFEEDBACK@NBCUNI.COM on Sun, 23 Sep 2007 08:36:46 -0700 The recipient name is not recognized The MTS-ID of the original message is: c=us;a= ;p=mca;l=USUSH2KEX210709231536SZASFSDG MSEXCH:IMS:MCA:USINA:USUSH2KEX21 0 (000C05A6) Unknown Recipient Anyone else got any contact info for the administrators for this forum.

Sorry, I had this posted in two places! and forgot to check back here! OOPS! I hadn't thought about the size of the file!! And I know all about the size limits, due to the sigs that we post on this particular forum!! Just didn't put two and two together on that one!! Now I feel stupid!! DUHHH!!! MC: I do agree with you about having to listen to music that I don't like on sites and forums.I tend to not go back either. But this particular forum/BB is a private one for a few of us that play the same online game. In THIS case it would not have been inappropriate. And I would have had it on it's own thread, not on the actual forum page. Thank you all for your input..... I ended up just posting a link to a Commercial site that had the song there. Karen