Not scorched earth, just cut with tree root killer. I'm saving the hackberry and elderberry bushes, there is also a pair tree. I have red twig dogwood tree seed and lots of arborvitae seeds, so a hedge in place of the line of trees by the road would be welcomed. The dogwood trees won't get bigger than 15 feet, but can see most gone in a few year totaled because the roots are going to be popping new shoots. If I do a clean sweep of everything especially the Chinese privots that grow like grass in the shadier places, it won't hurt. It's too dry to mess with fire accept in winter and we live in town on a 1/4 th acre lot. Old house built over a hundred years ago, needing repair just like the back yard does. The sycamore, sassafrass, and walnut tree really cause a lot of problems and need to go unless I can find a way to grow something between them and the trees. Do you think arborvitaes would absorb most of the poisons? They say to mulch in between the walnut trees by so many feet and it has less of a poison factor. I'll have to look into it, but I'm looking for a woodcutter right now. The trees have nice properties, but all together they are dangerous in case we really need to rely on the food. I don't mean to bring up politics, but we almost went into a depression and are now talking about world wars with Russia China, so goods will be limited if anything like that should happen. Besides look at the cost of tomatoes? That is crazy and it's mostly gouging. A family or even a single person would be smart to keep a garden. Europe is better about it than the US, but I live in a rural area, even in Detroit most of my neighbors had a little garden. I only had one garden in Detroit, and it did bad due to new ground and it being planted over an old junk yard, could have been fixed, but not this yard. Many of the others who lived here had terrible gardens and mostly planted herbs from what I can see. I also want to make a correction, the plant I called an elderberry with the berries was the chinese privot. I've got a few hackberry and elderberry trees. Thanks for the help! That did fix me up for the next year and I'll keep composting and maybe try just raised beds, even though I know I should try container at least once to get one good garden.

I see some folks have posted photos but I haven't yet figured out how to do this. Pics can be posted to any forum. First you will need to upload your pic to an on line pic storage site. I use and like Photobucket,, the free version. Once you have your pic at Photobucket, just follow the steps below. 1...just type your message,...or in this case a reply to this post, changing the Subject of Posting line by one character. 2...open Photobucket in another tab 3...find the pic you want to post in the message, 4...click on HTML code found in the third box below the pic. It will say copied in yellow, 5...go back and paste the HTML in your message box, 6...hit preview, You will then see your message, and the actual pic, and 7... lastly hit submit. If you have any problems, stop over at The Test Forum Gallery and someone will be glad to help. Sue

Here is what is listed on the database at Gardenweb: If you want to search the web, try Helleborus hybridus for the orientalis-type garden hybrid. Here is a link that might be useful: Helleborus

Karen, You'll first need to open a free Photobucket account. This is not the only way, but it is the easiest. I am including the link below. After you have your photos uploaded to Photobucket,(it helps me to have my GW post in a separate window) you just go to the HTML tag and click in the box...this copies the link, then go back to your GW post and press CTRL + V to paste the picture in your post. Alternately you can right-click and paste. If you just want to link to the photo, you can copy/paste the URL link into the "Optional Link URL" line below your post and give a 'friendly' or descriptive name to the link in the line below (Name of the Link). HTH, Pam Here is a link that might be useful: Photobucket Main Page