Lovely pot!! To some degree, what you choose will depend on what shape you want - tall and rigid, tall and flowing, short and round, short and weeping, etc. My two favorite choices would be: Spirea Ogon AKA mellow yellow, which is fountain shaped rather than the rounded or bun shape of many spireas. White flowers, fine willowy yellow to chartreuse summer foliage, and red-gold fall color. Clematis Stolwijk Gold, which has gold to chartreuse leaves and early blue flowers. Grown on a medium trellis I think this would look stunning. Ninebark I think will be too big for the pot based on my P. coppertina. I'm personally not a fan of privet and IME they get pretty huge also. Some other thoughts: Yellow oak leaf hydrangea, Little Honey, though it has a reputation for being a bit fussy. It likes at least part shade Yellow-variegated shrub dogwoods (Cornus), though they might be too large Yellow elderberries (Sambucus) might stay small enough in your pot though they get large in the ground Clumping bamboos, though I am not sure if any of the yellowish ones will be hardy enough for you. Yellow leaved evergreens, such as some of the Chamaecyparis, would have foliage year round if you will be leaving the pot outside. Some heathers have yellow to gold to orange foliage depending on the time of year and the variety. Caryopteris such as Sunshine Blue have gold foliage and late season blue flowers. You'd need to check if the flowers coordinated with the pot. Gold grasses, either variegated like some of the Miscanthus, or solid like gold Hakone grass. You might also want to consider a water garden in your pot with papyrus, though it wouldn't be hardy or yellow. Here is a link that might be useful:

I guess you'd have to be in my shoes to see the damage-yes, damage-done by this obsession with prairies as "the" native vegetation, all while forests continue to be converted to parking lots and car washes ad nauseum. It's well beyond the time I've got right now-I'm smack in the middle of doing data gathering for Wetland Mitigation Monitoring Reports for our DNR and the Army Corps of Engineers-in sites which are prairie plantings no less, to fully flesh this out. I've taken shots at it here and there on the various native-oriented forums here on GW. We're talking highly nuanced, but most people just want to receive a very simple message that if they cut down the blue spruce and plant some Rudbeckias in their yards, they've done great things for nature. I dare say, I think you'd be surprised if you knew the full extent of my personal and professional involvement in this area. And BTW, as vegetation manager for our many Stormwater utility sites and projects, I am directly involved in the installation and maintenance of prairie plantings.....not restorations...but which I do in fact view as little oases of habitat for those organisms which do best there. However, due to our location right in the middle of said tension zone, I've devoted considerable effort to educating my associates as to just exactly what vegetation communities are truly native here. We've therefore expanded the total plant palette we use at such sites. You'd be extremely hard-pressed to convince me this has not been an important and positive contribution. What has happened, again due to what I call the prairie lobby, is that because the basic methodology of prairie formation/maintenance is that these were pyric plant communities, now everyone thinks all the land around here burned every three years, or some equivalent bit of nonsense. In fact, the county I live in was originally covered by primarily northern hardwood forest, which indeed does burn sometimes, but research has shown the fire interval to be roughly 400 years! I decry the simple-minded way that so many avowed native enthusiasts view plant community management, due to the unwarranted intrusion of this kind of thinking into every corner of the discipline. Pyric plant communities are great, they did exist in this state, but they are far, far from the whole story. And this unwarranted simplification does a disservice to nature at large. I've literally been standing in the middle of one of our created prairies with one of the big guys, the acknowledged experts, in the field of native restoration, as they wondered if this strain of big bluestem, or that patch of switchgrass, was genetically appropriate for our locale,while during the whole time, an adjacent tract of forest was being torn down for more houses....with not a word or so much as a thought given to the utterly wanton destruction going on next door, so to speak. This rubs me the wrong way, to say the very least. +oM

Sending wishes for four special ladies: Carol, congratulations on the new baby in the family and hope you are feeling better now that your meds have caught up to you. Susie and Anita, prayers for you that you will be better soon. Sassy, I'm hoping the situation with you brother has improved. Take care of yourselves! The sun has been out here the last two days which is helping. We had bad storms the day before that. We have been getting rain regularly since January and I guess we forgot about the problems it brings - my winter sown containers get flooded and then I spend a few days completely taking the tops off in the daytime so they can dry out a bit and recovering them at night. At least I don't seem to have lost anything yet. However, now that I have planted over 100 containers, it is quite a project! Actually, most of the milk jugs seem to be able to handle the rain, it's all my smaller "use anything style" containers that are having the bad problems. I will definitely save the milk jugs to use again next year. Actually, we go through lots of milk at our house but nearly all the milk jugs now are opaque rather than transparent so there are only a few that we can save. Sometimes I cut the whole top off the opaque ones and try to use them, but then the plastic that I put over the top does not hold up well to the heavy rain. I use rubber bands to attach plastic to the top of the container and those seem to snap apart every few days. Maybe eventually I will get just the right set up. However, the plants in the ground are happy as can be and I will have wonderful displays of daffodils and tulips this year. Will have to post pictures soon. Jeanne

Well I'm NOT a blue person. Indoors I have NO blue. My husband doesn't understand this. I have no idea why I feel this way. Outdoors things are different! I have a blue/yellow/white garden bed which I love. Yes, delphineums, catananche, campanulas, baptisia and more, are mixed with trollius, coreopsis moonbeam, peony Claire de Lune and low growing white clematis and aquilegia. It is a big mix and wouldn't be any fun at all without the blue! There are loads of clematis that are purple or blue/purple, but also some very nice blues I think. You do get into the question of "what is blue?" My husband and I think this could well be a male/female issue! Also, by saying a flower is blue, perhaps a catalogue gains more sales? * Posted by: coolbeans (My Page) on Sat, Feb 2, 02 at 13:12 This is my VERY favorite thread, and I totally agree with all those who feel that there is just "something" about blue flowers; they ARE magical, they ARE very special; and they make me happier than any other color flower. Don't know why...I just started a flat full of Bluebird delphinium seeds I saved from my one lonely plant last year. A bunch of them germinated, so now I can't wait to have a huge stand of them! Maybe they won't bloom this year, but maybe they will. And also "true blue" penstemons, I'm trying for the first time. I can't get enough of this precious color. * Posted by: Anne_Marie_Alb (My Page) on Tue, Feb 5, 02 at 17:47 WOW....... Did anyone realize that this thread started almost 5 years ago... on Feb. 15, 1997!!!!! I am amazed it has survived that long. Probably, the oldest thread still on the top page! I wonder if "Clare B" (who started the thread) is still an active member of the Garden Web!!! I personally love blue flowers (I mean blue, and not purple, which I also like). I can't believe how many blue flowers I am starting from seeds this year... and that was just a pure coincidence! I also love RED flowers.. Maybe, I should start a "red flower" thread! I will first check the archives! * Posted by: Clare (My Page) on Thu, Feb 7, 02 at 20:34 Yes, Ann_Marie, I am still here! I will be a bit sad to see this thread fade away when it hits the 100 posts mark. After that, the threads are closed. I don't think I have any true blue flowers still. "Victoria Blue" Salvia is the closest thing. I use it a lot. It is such a heavy, long bloomer, and about one in twenty of them will survive winter here. Just wish I could predict which would survive so that I could save seed from those alone and perhaps work up a more hardy strain. By the way, the Hydrangeas in Memphis, Tennessee are incredible. Some are so saturated blue that I'd have to call them navy. * Posted by: Dswan (My Page) on Sat, Feb 9, 02 at 22:37 I'm going to add to this extremely long thread only because there really is something to true blue. I grow from seed a very difficult plant to propagate called Penstemon cyananthus or Wasatch Penstemon. I cold stratify and plant these every year in hopes of gettting one or two in my garden every year. Absolutely gorgeous. * Posted by: Rosa (My Page) on Mon, Mar 11, 02 at 10:24 Did no one mention Gentians-now those are blue! (along with my favorite penstemson of course-some are indeed blue). * Posted by: pineshade7b ) on Mon, Apr 15, 02 at 11:02 i agree with gloria mc coy. i love blue and green , they are my favorite colors in anything. just look in my house and closets. blue..ocean, blue jeans, my own eyes are blue and my husband's are green. many reasons to answer -why blue. although i do not "hyperventilate" , if i should go into a nursery and ask for a blue -flowering plant and the staff looks down their nose at me, i'll know now that they are only doing it because they think I'M a snob. until i adopted gardening as a serious hobby i had no idea that blue was a "snob" color. i just naturally began to look into flowers in the colors i liked personally. you learn something new everyday. i would have been hurt and confused to walk into a nursery and be looked at like a pariah, what did i say? now i know, thanks clare. * Posted by: DesertGardner (My Page) on Fri, Apr 19, 02 at 12:38 Wow - I never knew there was such a controversy over the color blue in the garden. After reading all the posts, I now understand why some gardeners prefer the color. And I have to say that I've never met any gardeners whom I would consider snobbish. Most of them are really quite down to earth! (if you pardon the expression...) I recently tried planting a red, white and blue flower bed, with 'Victoria Blue' Salvia being my blue color. It's a little too purple and doesn't look right as a "patriotic" design. I will probably tear out the red and white and keep the "blue" (purple) since it seems to like this desert heat. Someone mentioned black flowers, and I remembered seeing black pansies in the most recent Burpee catalog. They're a beautiful velvety black with a spot of yellow in the center. I think I'll plant some this winter, and start an obsession with black flowers! (just kidding Clare...) -Kara [* Posted by: yeona_sky (My Page) on Mon, Jun 24, 02 at 0:37 I just bought a blue poppy and am nervously watching its progress. My success with blues has been an up hill battle, but that hasn't changed my desire to spotlight it in my garden. Why blue?, again it's a passion with me. Clare, I hope you get the last word on this thread, and I hope you understand Why blue, a little better. * Posted by: Duster (My Page) on Wed, Jun 26, 02 at 23:56 I agree with the many others about getting annoyed when purple is referred to as blue. Maybe that's why I take up the cause of truly blue flowers! 99% of my Delphiniums are the true electric blue ones. I'd love one of the Himalayan Poppies but just not right for my little yard. I like the blue flowers, rather than the blue foliage plants. And no, blue is NOT my favorite color - I have nothing blue in my home decor. I just like the uniqueness of the TRUE blue and my stubbornness to get people to stop calling it purple!!!!