I so agree. The cats outside cats, I used to keep, were much more of a problem for myself and my neighbors. They bothered the neighbor's landscaping, One of them howled outside of my neighbor's windows, during the early morning hours, they came home with parasites from the birds and mice they ingested, My black cat was stollen over the holloween holiday, and the cats often came home bitten and scratched up from fighting with other cats, along with one of them coming home injured so badly from a car hitting it that it suffered greatly and died. For way too long I believed it was cruel to keep a cat indoors, I am very sorry that it took me so long to realize that it is much better for all concerned to train cats to be content indoor pets. It took me much less time to learn how to keep them from stinking up the house and or causing damage to the drapes and furniture. I have not quite learned how to keep them from damaging the foliage on my indoor plants, which are looking pretty sad now.

I have found that this far north I can often push the envelope with sun requirements. I grow several dogwoods in full sun, although they tend to be trees that prefer to grow in part shade. I have 4 Cornus alternifolia (pagoda dogwood, a native) and a Cornus kousa (kousa dogwood) all in full sun along with some in part shade. The full sun plants tend to be denser and have more flowers. The kousa won't be hardy enough for you, but the pagoda dogwood will be. It has a lovely winter silhouette of dark gray, layered branches, creamy Queen Anne's lace type of flowers (not what one normally thinks of as dogwood flowers) in spring, and clusters of small berries that ripen through red to dark purple with bright red stems that the birds love. Fall color is yellow and pinky-red, rather like an almost ripe peach. It can be multi-stemmed or single stemmed. Truly an all-season tree. There are some with variegated leaves (both green/white and green/gold) but I wouldn't recommend those for your location since they would probably burn. From garden photos 07 From garden photos 07 Other possibilities to research that I've seen growing near me or have grown myself: smaller disease resistant crab apples, the hardier strain of redbud from Bailey's nursery, Hawthornes such as Crataegus viridis 'Winter King', Yellowwood (Cladrastis kentukea). Remember that since you are so far north, many trees such as the yellowwood may not reach their maximum possible size for many, many years, if ever. Regardless of what you plant, I'd give it a good layer of mulch (though not right against the trunk) out to the tree's drip line to keep the soil cooler and more moist to mitigate the baking sun effect. Proper watering will also be needed for a tree to thrive on a hot slope. I've linked the Missouri Botanical Garden's search page as another good resource in addition to the U Conn hort search linked above. Here is a link that might be useful: Missouri Botanical Garden search

Hi, I can help. Dirr, Michael A and Heuser, Charles, Jr. ÂThe Reference Manual of Woody Plant Propagation: From Seed to Tissue CultureÂ; (Second Edition 2006); Varsity Press, Inc. ISBN: 0942375092 or ISBN: 13: 978-0-942375-09-1 states: "Cuttings 4-6" from current season's growth, 2500 to 10,000 ppm IBA-solution, peat:perlite, mist, rooted in high percentages. Cuttings can be transplanted, fertilized lightly and will continue to grow." This environment could easily be achieved in a basement setting under artificial lighting with any plastic product that seals the humidity in (milk jug, poly-constructed box etc). I'd also spray often with a fungaecide/algaecide such as 'Consan 20.' 'Dip and Grow' rooting solution seems to be the best product on the market. Use at a rate of 1:10 parts water. Dax

Digit, I'm very glad to hear you're getting precip.! Our whopper of a winter has receded into a dry spring. There have been some thunderstorms over the last few weeks, but they are hit or miss. I was lucky enough to get between 3/4-1" of rain 10 days ago. It was enough to fill the rain barrels. Skybird lives 15 miles due south of me and she got a 10th of an inch from the same storm. We did get some snow storms in March, but seem to have dodged the heavy March and April snows that are so important for spring growth. We have gotten snow storms mid to late May in previous years, but there don't seem to be any in sight, yet! What I find interesting this spring is the behavior of my fruit trees. I have a Manchurian apricot tree, it was in full flower April 6th last year. I went through some older phone pics and in 2020 it was in bloom on April 10th. It flowers so early that it gets zapped by our spring snow storms and freezing night temps every year. I average about 3 apricots a year from it. I spotted 3 flowers on it the other day. This morning the flowers are gone, but it's starting to leaf out. The Spring Snow crabapple is in full bloom, the chokecherries are leafing out and look like they'll bloom in the next week. The fruiting apple trees have not flowered yet, but are leafing out. I'm speculating that the long, cold, wet winter kept them in dormancy longer than usual. I'd hoped that our lack of cold April snows might yield a better chance for a fruit crop this year. Now I really don't know. I've gradually come to measuring the soil temps with a goal of 60 degrees before planting out tomatoes, peppers and eggplants. Some people here have already reached that. I haven't checked yet, as it tends to occur late May/early June. I am going to do that soon. This may be a year when warm weather crops can go out earlier than usual. Every year weather is weird in Colorado, it's just a different kind of weird each year! Barb