personally i would be done with it ... it seems to usually happen at night in the winter ... howling winds.. heavy snow or ice ...... or during the day in summer .. an afternoon thunderhead with extreme winds ... not really hard and fast rules ... but the key .. for me.. is prevailing winds ... e.g. .. my winds... blow from the NW .... so if the tree was upwind of the house.. i would be concerned ... on the SE side... ODDS ARE ... it would ...might.. perhaps... fall away from the house ... but then.. most freak storms seem to defy the odds of prevailing winds.. and come howling out of some unknown direction ... you can ponder your navel on this one forever... but it takes only one catastrophe to find out your navel was wrong ... i have an inordinate fear of trees falling on me or the family in the night... i would have it gone in no more than the time it takes to schedule its destruction ... and it makes primo firewood ... and fantastic chipped mulch ... as for the spouse.. it sounds more like a marriage counselor issue.. for which i am not qualified ... go buy him a couple pieces of wet oak.. and have him hoik them around the yard.. to feel the weight of such.. then ask him if you can drop a piece from the eave onto his foot.. then ask him to contemplate the weight of the whole tree ... falling on the 2 x 4 framing of the house ... even 2 x 6 ... i have serious doubts that this pre-existing condition would be covered by home owners ins ... on a preventative basis ... but i am sure weirder things are possible ... if it were me.. i would be done with it.. and plant 4 to 6 new oaks... which grow 3 to 5 feet per year ... and enjoy watching them grow to replace the problem child ... and would not plant the new any closer than 30 feet from the house ... good luck with dealing with spouse and all .. ken ps: one winter.. after midnight.. severe ice storm with severe winds ... 60 foot cherry, 30 feet from the house... 8 to 12 inch branches start exploding off the tree .... was awakened by the sound of cannon fire .... nothing hit the house.. needless to say ..... i didn't get back to sleep until the wind died down ...

I'll add that once it does start getting cold, sweater weather, growth slows down somewhat. My kale looks just like collards with flat leaves until we have that first really cold killing frost and then they get curly like kale is supposed to look. If I wait till the end of August to sow outside, my collards aren't very large by the end of the year. I'll be trying to start some inside this year and set them out just to see if I can get big ones like they have at the store. I always pride myself on having smaller collards that are more tender and sweeter because they aren't as large and overgrown. But folks at work like the larger ones anyway, so I'm going to try to accommodate them this year. I usually just sort of broadcast the seeds and have a bed of collards instead of a row of individual plants. Some spots are more crowded than others, but even the more sparse areas don't have larger collards either, so overcrowding isn't an issue. I guess I need to think of them as cabbages instead of cut and come again type greens. Anymore, folks at work are preferring kale to collards. I guess my harping on their nutritional value is paying off.

I can tell you what I have, but no photos! Stevia Chocolate mint Chippewa and Pink Lemonade Blueberry Illinois Everbearing Mulberry Prok Persimmon Starks 2-N-1 trees: pear, cherry, plum Pawpaws, Penn. Golden and Sunflower All are in their first year, but I am excited about them.

Joe, Gotta love this Midwest September weather ehhh? Too bad it doesn't last another three months. I have a ton of Long Red Slims in my second crop that are nearly full sized. My Habanero is packed again but still has a few first harvest pods left. My Hungarian Wax plants both were completely empty of pods and even buds a few weeks ago but are packed with new pods about half size now with many big blooms still coming. My Charleston still has a few first round pods left and just started putting out a few new blooms. My Bhuts Still have over half the first round pods left but have added a whole lot more new ones in the last few weeks. I am sad to say that I am gonna lose a lot of peppers to the onset of cold weather but I am hoping to get a good batch off the Hung wax before it is all done. Even if they are not completley ripe, I still love them pickled and sliced for sandwiches. Bruce