Activity

I want to thank everyone for shedding some light onto the subject and sharing your views. We have a clear concept on how we want to proceed in the future with hiring new potential employees.
I shared the opinions with my colleges, and we concluded that in this particular case testing the employee on basic CAD tasks through a  trial basis just…[Read more]

I agree. Although I am new to the profession I have quite a library going that has helped me in many areas of my development. If I don’t know something I spend time finding an answer before I would ever ask here. 
Beyond that I have found that if you do research first your questions become much better questions, if you still have any, because y…[Read more]

The ficus will grow in the shade, but it roots into any surface of whatever its growing on.  
And having had to maintain both of those vines during a previous life, I can say they both require constant pruning at 2 years on, and will look horrible for quite a while if it is let go too long to then be cut back.  

Have you considered wire vine ?…[Read more]

Thanks so much for sharing, Leslie. This is one of the better natural play ‘books’ that I have seen. I LOVE the Berkley Bayfront playground – it looks like a junkyard – and a kid is going down a slide on a pair of skis!!! Awesome! I would love to see more examples of how to construct some of the elements of the playground – for instance the log…[Read more]

I just wanted to add another link to a nice big whopper of a document I discovered on this topic:
http://naturalplay.files.wordpress.com/2010/07/naturalplay_infopacket_small.pdf

Very restrained and subtle for a Van Valkenburg project. I like it. The building, however, looks like a 1980’s public school.

http://seattletimes.com/html/nationworld/2010327228_bushlibrary22.html

An article with a photo of the model.

Great question.  Here are a couple that I have used in dry shade around oaks:
Ficus pumila (Creeping Fig)

Creeping Fig does well in sun or part shade and takes little irrigation (depending on where you live).  It can cling to walls and does not need any support.  Though, you should keep it pruned back.  I have seen it become top heavy and pul…[Read more]

Haha… 🙂

I’ve read the forum for a while but generally don’t say much.  I’d echo the comments from above by saying that I don’t look as often for reasons not unlike those above.  While things in Houston never really slowed down during the market downturn, I hope things are looking better for those that have seen a pretty rough go of it.  When I moved he…[Read more]

Henry! How was trout fishing in America? That boring?
I’ve been wondering too and have been lurking the discussions, but it takes a lot of time to write a well-thought-out response and yes, work is busy. Lots going on this year – beats the pants off of last year. Today is a snow day (!!! April 22nd?!) and just got a huge CD set out the door, so a…[Read more]

I’ll bite.  There are three reasons I personally haven’t been very active in the lounge lately:
Work has been busy.  This is a good thing.  Stateside we’ve had numerous projects funded by the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative.  Low water levels are unfortunately wreaking havoc on shipping and recreation.  Likewise with flooding.  Despite the b…[Read more]

Thanks Scott. JB

Darren,

Thank You.

JB

Hello Jennifer, Three years ago on one of our projects we planted 2-120″ box Q- agrifolias 1-84″ quercus agrifolia 1-72″ box and about 15-20 60″ box trees. (all are thriving) The 120″ and 84″ were field grown the 72″& 60″ were box grown. Because this project underwent quite a bit of grading and recompaction we made sure all of the trees had…[Read more]

Thank you so very much Andrew.

JB

ISA staking guidelines for trees over 3″ caliper show them to be cabled down to a stake or anchor at about a 60 degree angle with 1/2″ hose protecting the tree and surveyors flagging tied to the cables to make them visible. The 96″ crate would indicate that the tree is more than 3″ caliper
Vertical posts with the tree tied to them horizontally are…[Read more]

I think the same Rob. Thanks.

While staking trees is most often not best for the long term health of the tree, it is still advised in some situations. For small tree, the stakes can make up for the root system that ought to stabilize the tree.
But with a 96″Box tree, I can’t imagine that, in the event of a huge wind event, the stakes are going to stabilize the tree.

I recall having to do this for only one employer, my first out of college. The test was fairly simple, just sit down with a few premade blocks and try to design something out of them. That included having to explode and re-form the blocks, drawing lines and splines, as well as p-lines. One BIG clue to autocad competence is if the person is…[Read more]