[Bee]

1.can anything be done about the "random European shrubbery" that shows up in
open areas on the map.

I haven't got the slot beta myself, but I'm guessing that if you go into the load.ini and under Appendix and change Tree0 = Trees\AlteredBush9a.tga to: Tree0 = Trees/sk_AlteredBush8a.tga you should at least get those trees looking a darker green, rather than the unconvincing bright green default ones that came with PF.