Sue, I have to disagree with you in that I feel that you really are the container queen here. LOL But seriously, your containers are the best I've ever seen anywhere bar none. That one you have with the orange Acalpha (I think that is what it is)is the most dynamite container I've ever seen. I love that! Also, that one you have with the Euphorbia cotinifolia (I'm thinking that is what that plant is)next to your hot tub in the JoAnn's pot is another winner in my book. You just have so many outstanding arrangements with outstandingly grown unusual plants. I marvel at them. Kathy, thanks for the heads up about the MaxSea fertilizer. I've googled it and it turns out it is supposed to be great for orchids which I grow indoors here as well. Anyway I found a site and ordered it! Cool! Like I said I like to rotate the fertilizers as I think the plants do better for it. I'm looking forward to seeing how this one works. ~~If you like nuggets of frivolity you should pop over and join us on the Idylls. Great group of gardeners! Deanne

Wow--thank you everyone for the suggestions! I did call the Lake County nursery about their "Biblical series" after Sue mentioned the "Galilean." The man there was obviously knowledgable about the trees since he grows them (in zone 5) and these particular trees are hardy to zone 4. I think I'm going to go with a variety called "Prophet" (similar to Galilean, but with smaller bracts.) Samzan (as another had suggested has variated leaves--which I'm not as partial to.) It really is amazing to me how a "dogwood" can be so many things. Is it an American Dogwood, or a Japanese? If it's a Japanese, there are a hundred or so varieties to choose from to suit your needs. How big do you want the flowers to bloom? How big do you want the flowers to be? How disease resistant? So many factors to look at before choosing. I didn't realize going in that there are actually different cultivars of the kousa. No one at the local nurseries ever mentioned that---it was simply: Here's a kousa, and here's a florida. Which one do you prefer? Thanks again for sharing all of your knowledge here---I have learned so much from you all.

It'll figure it out and faster than you'd expect :-) Other than training them towards the tree trunk, I've never tied or attached a clematis vine to the trunk or branches. They scramble up very easily on their own. If you value the dogwood, I may reconsider planting the SAC to grow through it. This will become a very large and very vigorous vine, producing a LOT of foliage growth, and has the potential for overwhelming a smallish tree like a dogwood. And I'd hate to consider removing the mass of entangled vines when pruning time comes. This can be an issue for growing any sort of clematis through something as large and as complex in branch structure as a tree - all of my clematis that are growing through trees are vines that I do not need to prune back or very infrequently.

I was advised that dogwoods are "understory" trees and not meant to be planted in full, direct sun. That being said, we lost a dogwood that we had planted in a part shade location. It's leaves exhibited similar symptoms as you described and we also felt that it had adequate, but not too much water. I saw an article and picture in Garden Gate magazine describing "bacterial leaf scorch" that seemed to fit what was going on with our tree. Every spring it would leaf out fine, but one or two branches would be dead. Then at some point in the summer, the leaf edges would begin to brown and the leaves would never turn colors in the fall, just brown and eventually fall. After giving it five years, we just took it out. Hope you have better luck!