Inaugural Blog

Welcome to my site, my inaugural blog as it were. Hope you find something here of interest in these waning days of what has turned out to be the easiest winter in many years. Easiest winter ever? Not sure about that one, but the easiest in a long while. On that subject, the USDA is reworking its zone map to reflect changes in climate (perhaps) and to provide more detail in those shaded maps we've all seen over the years. I hope they're not getting too cocky about their maps; all it would take is one cold winter, or maybe a cold snap in a given winter, to play havoc on their maps, and cause a lot of damage.

For what it's worth, the Redbud tree I planted in my front yard which I purchased from a local nursery has bitten the dust. It is a variety of Eastern Redbud, and are considered marginally hardy in this area, though they're listed as hardy to zone 4 in the books. We, however, live in a valley that is routinely 4-5 degrees cooler than, say, Stillwater or Hudson (downtown). Could that have killed our beloved Redbud? Maybe, but it also points up the difficulty with those zone maps, trying to factor in all the variables and small localizations that muck up the works.

Thought I'd throw in a couple of photos from a job we did last year. Nothing quite as dramatic as a good before and after photo. This job provided some interesting challenges (challenge is another word for opportunity) which we made the most of. If you get a chance, check out our website for more photos--click on featured projects.  http://www.outdoorconcepts.biz/  Thanks for visiting my blog--check back from time to time as I'll be updating frequently.