Thank you all for the very helpful--and de-stressing--information! In light of this, my husband and I discussed the situation further, and I learned that when he used the snowblower, he arched the snow over the Low Glow that was 8' away. However, he did a direct hit with it on the Pinus densiflora 'Jane Kluis' and a couple of other small pines that were planted at the same time in July that are in a small island in the driveway and were only 3' away from the snowblower! They look almost perfect, except for fractionally brown tips that I had to look hard to see. He also said he'd watered all of the July plantings several times more than I'd thought he had. These 3 other pines get the west wind, but were protected from the direct winter sun most of the day by lots of tall oak and hickory trunks. The house and more deciduous trees blocked the SW and NW winds here. Also, I had planted a couple of rose bushes and a few perennials about 3-4' away from these pines (until they fill in), and had soaked them every other day during July and August, so some of their water probably got to the pines. The Low Glow is down the driveway about 15' from the street (that doesn't get salted) and is in a wide open area where it gets the wind from all directions. I looked a little more carefully, and it is the NW (not N) side, as well as the south side, that is most brown. The top and center, north, and east sides are all nicely green. The buds look tan all over. Whew! I do think, though, that since it had such a huge root ball, that it probably never got enough water last summer. Ken, thanks for the welcome; I posted a couple of times last year, but that's not enough for you to remember. I wonder how old our Low Glow is--it doesn't look like any of those in your link since they all are just youngsters! Also, ours has shorter needles, since they said at the nursery that they'd been pinched to keep them that way, if I'm remembering correctly. I went out and measured, and ours is 4-1/2' tall and 7' wide. The trunk is 5" in diameter, and the tree has been beautifully pruned. The trunk is 21" tall before any branches appear. We found it out in a distant part of the nursery with the deciduous trees. It was in a huge pot, and looked like it had been there for a while. My husband fell in love with it immediately (I did too, but the price was a real stopper!) and decided he just had to have it. ;o) I just remembered that it's not too long until magnolia time at Hidden Lake Gardens, and that it's because of one of your posts, Ken, that we went there and saw all of the conifers last year which started our pine purchases. My husband sort of went crazy as we wandered through the many kinds of conifers, and he raved about the gorgeous bark of the tanyosho pine there, which is what got us out to the nursery. They had only one, but it had a 4" diameter trunk, and the branches shooting up in the vase shape like the one at Hidden Lake Gardens, so we bought it. We'd seen some elsewhere which looked more like a tree rose with a tall skinny trunk and short branches sticking out of the top--not very attractive in our opinion. tsugajunkie, we also got 5 beautiful 7-8' Canadian hemlocks to block the neighbors' houses. I LOVE the softness and gracefulness of the branches. I'm trying to decide if a Jeddeloh, or some other form, will work above a 10' wide section of our rock wall out front. BTW, when I was looking at the Jane Kluis, I noticed that on some of the lower branches there were some 3" needles surrounding the 1 to 1-1/4" needles that are also found on the rest of the bush. Is there something I should do about these? Is there some place we can get information on how to prune, pinch, and shape Japanese pines? Thanks very much for all of your help! Anne

I've spoken to the nursery and sent them digital photos. Their horticulturalist tells me that its not a pathogen but rather, a watering problem, which I don't agree with. I have 55 other conifers on the property and they are all essentially flourishing -- some browning on a few arborviate, but thats all. Certainly no blackening. I have difficulty accepting that this plant somehow slipped through the cracks and was miswatered badly enough to cause rapid deterioration in multiple colors, with a white excretion as well. The horticulturalist attributes the brown to insufficient watering, the black to excessive watering. On the same plant. The white, they suggest, is sap ooze. They are sending the photos to someone else to look at but the gist of it is that they refuse to give me another plant. I still fear pathogen and the infection of 6 other pines, not to mention the aesthetic issue of a very unwell looking plant with both brown and black discoloration. So it gets pulled.

'Silver Ghost' is a Pinus bungeana cultivar indeed. Will show us this one and not the Pinus densiflora 'Golden Ghost'. Also the silvery bark comment is for the 'Silver Ghost', not for the 'Golden Ghost'. Pinus bungeana doesn't have the typical red buds which Pinus densiflora does have, also the needles are differend. Frank, that 'Ceserini's Variegated' looks fantastic! It looks more white/yellow then variegated! I see a litte difference in colour in the left under part. What is this? You're telling us that these seedling are from last March, but in my opinion these are 2 years old, are these from March last year? Which Picea seedlings you're showing us in the first pic? Please keep us informed in the future about these seedlings. (If I remember well I asked you this before, I'm very curious which new varieties you will find ;0)) 'Golden Ghost' in my collection.

A pic of mine planted last year.