at the link.. is a guy who knows how to buy mulch ... i had suggested.. way back when.. a delivery by stake truck ... i dont recall having read how you did it all .. though i do recall that you suggested it nearly killed you .. lol... if you asked.. i missed it.. the one time i bought black mulch ... it retained so much heat.. and got so hot in the sun.. it cooked some of my groundcover type plants ... so .. in the future.. you might want to go a different direction ... in fact.. with your blue house .. an un-colored mulch.. which fades to grey would be my suggestion ... BTW.. is yours actually dyed black.. or is that just natural??? the soil in these pics.. look KINDA dry ... if its just surface.. that OK ... if your finger..a t 2 or 3 inches.. indicates to is still damp.. down in the root mass ... i suspect i know why your mulch is pulled so far back ...but if that is basically the surface of what was in the pot. and you did not break the pot ball up well ... you might want to not leave the mulch at the edge of where the pot was ... bring it closer to the trunk ... but not mounded on the trunk .... it will help alleviate the 'look' of being bone dry ... and finally.. it looks just like most of my picea pungens .. [how about you move toward latin names] .... they are some of the latest conifers to get a move on .... your buds look just fine .... ken Here is a link that might be useful: link

Those brown things are shoot tips deformed by the Cooley's spruce gall aphid so as to form chambers for the rearing of their young. The infested tips will not grow anymore, but the healthy ones are usually more than enough to keep the tree healthy and growing. They can be successfully sprayed early in the season -- see an extension agent for what to use.

Did you buy this conifer from the same nursery you took the clipping to? I tend to be very suspicious of their amateurish diagnosis unless you spoke to a trained horticulturist. Black spots on leaves or conifer needles need expert analysis to determine what the real issue is that is causing you problem. I would remove it now. I would bet if a couple strong hands grabbed hold of that tree you could pull it right out of the hole. In its stressed condition probably no root growth has taken place. After you have it out of the ground hose the root ball to expose root structure. You could find there is not enough root structure there to promote its ability to grow and be healthy. If that's the case there's your answer to you problem. If not then disease and I revert back to fungus is the villain. What ever the cause I would clean up the planting area to the extent not one needle is left in the mix to re-infect your new planting. Dave

Wow - you dug up a seriously old post! So I did end up planting a very long screen -- basically the entire length of the property line -- and I'm actually really happy with how it turned out. We used Thuja Green Giant arborvitae in the center where the tallest part of the house we are trying to block out is -- we planted them a decent distance apart, not all jammed up like I see people do for a property line screen. They have grown fast, widened out, and are basically almost up to the roof of the house we are trying to hide. I think they should cap out right about 35 feet or so, which won't block the view. We planted a few during our initial planting then filled in with a few more a couple years later -- those later plantings are a bit stunted - not sure if it's because we squeezed them into less space or they were just inferior to begin with (originals came from a nursery and were planted by a landscaper, later ones from Home Depot and we DIYed them). But they are all growing well and healthy, and seem impervious to deer, wind, cold, snow, etc. To the sides of the arborvitate, we used Nellie Stevens hollies. They too have grown fast. They don't much care for the wind -- they ended up looking pretty bad by the end of the last two winters (which were brutally cold and windy) but they filled in with new leaves in the spring. The deer don't seem to eat them either. And again, I think they cap out at 20 feet or so. To the sides of that (which is getting away from blocking the house and now just screening their yard from ours) we used forsythias planted very close together that we let grow wild into a thick hedge -- mainly because I love forsythia. It's not evergreeen but the hedge is so thick and branches are so close together that it does a decent job of screening even in winter. And in spring when it is in bloom, it is an absolutely stunning wall of yellow. Again the deer don't bother them and they seem to grow well without much care. And finally at the very end of the property lines, we used sea green junipers -- again, we were looking for something evergreen but it didn't need to be tall - we were only trying to hide the neighbor's "junk pile" which was unfortunately located so that it was the first thing you saw when you pulled into our driveway. Those are the plants that look the sickliest -- there's always big brown patches in them and the snow breaks the branches. But they are farthest from the house and from far away they look ok, so I don't mind them. I think if I had to do it over again, I'd have used all forsythia instead of also using juniper -- the forsythia are just so amazingly gorgeous when they are in bloom. I would take a picture for you but we are in the middle of a storm right now -- if I remember, I will get one tomorrow. Here's a link to a pic of what it looked like when we first planted itin 2009: Newly planted And here's a shot from the summer of 2012 (sorry for lousy pic -- best I could find): Three years old I would say that this year it really started to look good since the green giants are basically touching now.