Thank you Tom, Yes, I am looking for the chamaecyparis p. now to mix with plicatas (and maybe hemlock). Can you recommend any nice TALLER chamaecyparis p. cultivars? everything I am finding would only get 2-3 or 3-4 feet high tops, and my chain link is 5 ft tall and I would love to be able to hide it!! So, in summary, my plan for today is the following for the ~300 ft border. There are 3 sections of it, the further West ~50 feet sometimes damp but part sunny (which is not visible from the house because of 2 ~20 ft Norways are blocking the view). I want something narrow there because I started an orchard there, so I may do the HW bare root, nothing else and I will see if deer attack those. Then I have ~200 feet section which is mixed, part sunny and some areas get damp and shady, so this is my main concern, this section I see from various parts of the house. I would like to plant a natural looking hedge (Dax's influence). But now you got me thinking again, should I try to mix in picea abies cupressina with the plicatas and chamaecyparis p.? The old norways which are planted in the sunnier area are doing extremely well in that area... Then at the end (of the 300ft border), I have a sunny but swampy wet area of ~50 feet in which area I only care that it is green and tall to block the view of the private road and the main road visible in the distance. So, I just need to do a background green. I do not plan on cutting/shearing trees there. So, for this section I am still not completelely decided... maybe GG or plicatas straight species but worried about the size being too wide and taking too much space. I have a question for a different spot in my yard, adjusent to this swampy area, but this is ~20 feet of swampy wet, often standing water and mostly deep shade, what do you think, would chamaecyparis nootkatensis pendula w/metasequoias or taxodium distichum be an option for there?

I've found that Aquaponics seems to extend the growing season for tomatoes a bit as does adding some shade for the hottest part of the day during the hottest part of the season. Even so, when the night time temps don't get cool enough, the plants probably won't set fruit but if they are indeterminate, they can just keep growing until the nights cool off and allow them to start setting fruit again. Be prepared for monster plants though and don't be scared to prune hard though that might make for some not so attractive plants. If you want to know about good summer crops for around here, sweet potatoes are good so log as you can provide enough water to them (leaves and vine tips are a handy edible summer green too.) Okra does well in the high heat as do many southerns peas and beans, yardlong beans seem to like the heat (peas and beans can also improve the soil by fixing nitrogen.) I'm trying out Strawberry spinach this summer as well as New Zeland Spinach since I don't like the taste of Malabar spinach though it is an attractive plant. Basil can grow on through the summer if you keep cutting it. Some melons can also do well in the extreme heat at least for a while though when the rains come you might need to watch for splitting. for some light shade mixed through the garden it might be worth planting some moringa or papaya among the garden space though these plants can be killed back to the ground by frost so might not be as useful long term in zone 9 and cooler. Mixing stuff like corn, sunflowers, and other tall stuff into the garden among everything else can help provide some shade and make a small garden more productive than if you simply planted just one type of plant. Mix things up with low growing plants to help cover the ground and keep it cool and moist then some middle level plants and then some tall plants all jumbled together and add some flowers and herbs into the mix and the pests get more confused and the beneficial bugs are attracted and the garden is more productive. Heck, I've still got lettuce surviving in my herb garden and it's been over 93 F here every day for a week!

Hi All, I just wanted to make an interesting observation about the Indigo Rose that I planted from seed I collected the first time I grew it in 2012. I planted a flat of tomato seeds in the late spring of last year with the intention of planting a garden but due to a myriad of distractions I failed to do so... I kept watering the flat on occasion but was mostly neglectful and every so often would pull out the dead and dying until one day in august (I think, maybe september) I decided to plant the survivors who were quite stunted but alive none the less! To my surprise they immediately jumped into action and began to grow rapidly, so since I live in temperate Southern California I decided to let them go and see what happened, in short order they started to set fruit but not ripen very quickly which is a known factor so in keeping with my 2014 gardening 'style' I ignored them some more except for watering and they continued to grow and set fruit throughout the the fall and winter and I have been able to pick some ripe fruit through December and January so far... I was pruning them back yesterday and noticed that some plants were still putting off new branches and flowers so it makes me wonder if I kept better care of future plantings whether or not they might become something of a perennial tomato... Interesting huh?

Thitiponk –Black Madeira is one variety that you have to be very careful about buying, especially on eBay. A prominent nursery was selling what they thought was Black Madeira for a number of years and recently discovered it wasn’t that variety at all. But people bought it, made cuttings, sell plants they believe are BM, and the wrong BM fig continues to be sold. Also, sellers from Madeira Island sell cuttings of black figs which they call "Black Madeira", but are different also. These are all probably good figs, but not BM. Do a little homework on the fig forums before you buy it to make sure you're getting the real deal.