Suzanne I would like to have one of your viburnum bushes. I started with a blank canvas of 1-3/4 acres two years ago and though we plant most anything we find I need shrubs and bushes. I have 2 of my angel trumpets set aside for others but still have two left. I am also bringing aloe vera plants as they are wonderful to have around a garden for first aid purposes and will winter over easily indoors. Mine live inside all winter. I also have a few other things, however, due to senior moments I don't remember right now what they are. Shelia

I've learned that some shade for my produce plot is very important. I am a California gardener turned New Mexican. My gardening skills have been seriously challenged since I made the move to NM! Trees also mitigate the wind factor; I live on a mesa in central NM. This morning I began an experiment with branches from Santolina plants, to see if they will repel the beetles which kill off my squash plants. I pruned the Santolina and distributed the branches amongst the squash plants. I sure hope it works, because there is an army of grey colored beetles dong damage in the garden. I have three Santolina planted in a large bed of strawberries. The Santolinas got rid of the beetles which used to infest the strawberries. The marigolds seem to help repel ants. I have marigolds growing throughout my produce plot. The flowering plants which I've had good success with here are: roses (if they get some shade), dianthus, snapdragons, hollyhock, moss roses, honeysuckle, chrysanthemums, sunflowers, Maximillian sunflowers, yarrow, hibiscus, marigolds, Texas bluebells, creeping Veronica, plumbago, salvias, cosmos, bachelor buttons, penstemons, catmint, hummingbird mint and scabiosa. (Maximillians and yarrow are invasive plants. One has to plant them where it is okay for them to spread.) I am also growing blueberry bushes, strawberries, a couple of grape vines, asparagus, artichoke, summer squash, watermelon, cantaloupe, lima beans, bush beans, arugula, thyme, mediterranean oregano, basil, green chilies, corn, shallots, onions and garlic. I hope to do beets, chard, winter squash and kale for a fall crop. I have two young almond trees, which are doing well.

Okay, I'll bring some fig cuttings. Thank for the offer, but I have three figs trees which is all I have room for. Does anyone have seeds or small plants of the little vine LOVE IN A PUFF? If you do I'd like to get it going again. Reworked the beds it was in so thoroughly it didn't come back this year. BTW, I found some four inch pots of PORTERWEED at ARE so don't need those. Hopefully, I'll have some to share next year. See you all about this time tomorrow :-) MacArthur Park opens at 9:00.

Kim, To help the carrots break through, water the surface slowly with a sprinkler that is set to run at a low rate or with a soaker hose. Then put down cardboard (held down at the corners by something so it won't blow all the way to Tulsa) on top of the moist soil. Leave it there to prevent crusting and to hold in moisture. Lift it every morning and evening and watch for signs of sprouting seeds. As soon as you see the first sprouts, remove the cardboard or board. Of course, this only works if no carrots are up yet. In the future, one way to work around crusty soil would be to make a furrow about the width and depth of your index finger. Fill it with good finished compost. Sow the seeds in the compost trench. Keep it moist. They'll sprout fast in the loose compost. Another way to help the carrot seeds break through the crusty soil is to soil radishes along with the carrot seeds. Radish seeds will germinate first and produce larger sprouts that will push up through crusty soil and pave the way for the carrots. There's more than one way to skin a cat, and there's more than one way to deal with crusty soil. Bon, I am loving the cool weather and hope it lasts. We'll be hot and dry all too early as it is. We are, of course, a bit warmer here and I have beans and corn that are knee-high. This will be the first year in ages where I'll likely be picking snap beans at the same time I'm harvesting sugar snap peas. It is a crazy, mixed-up weather year. It isn't often that potatoes, onions and sugar snap peas are deliriously happy and growing like mad at the very same time that beans, corn, tomatoes and peppers are equally happy and growing equally well. Both the warm season and cool season crops are getting the kind of weather they like about half the time and it shows in how evenly matched their growth is. The asparagus is insane. I cannot even harvest it fast enough to keep up and many spears that have come up this year have been as big around as my thumb.....or bigger. More and more this year's weather is reminding me of the spring of 2012, and that was a superb garden year. Dawn