At 10.6-4.4-1.7 NPK %s its pretty high in P and quite low in K for houseplants, but it's still a so-so fertilizer and a better choice than any of the fertilizers with P (the middle number) as the highest %. How you fertilize to get the most out of your plants depends on your soil and watering habits. If you water in sips, you might fertilize at low doses infrequently - like maybe every month or so. If you flush the soil regularly when you water, it would be more appropriate to fertilize more frequently at higher doses. W/o some knowledge of the type of soil you're using and some knowledge of how you water, no one can really give you any meaningful advice. It took quite a bit of looking to determine the NPK %s of the fertilizer, but I have no idea what other nutrients it contains. It's important that your plant gets all the nutrients essential to growth - do you have any information that points to its complete nutrient content? It's NPK %s indicate it would be ok for any of your plants, but for the slow growers you might want to cut back on the concentration. It's just another soluble fertilizer, cut from the same cloth as Miracle-Gro, Peters, Schultz, and others. Tell me how you water and I should be able to give you a dosage that will work. Al

I've been told on this forum, that I should water 1 inch per week deep and infrequently Hang on there. That advice was for the deepest heat of summer. On the average, the average lawn needs it about weekly in the summer heat and about monthly in the cooler months. When you water, water all it needs at one time to get you through the current time period. YOUR MILEAGE WILL VARY based on your soil condition, type, shade/sun, wind, humidity, cloudy days, fog, dew, grass type, grass density, mowing height, and some other factors I'm forgetting. One inch may not be right. I have a house in San Antonio where they enforce water restrictions in the summer. I am limited to 7 hours of irrigation on Tuesday morning and night. My lawn is in deep shade but the soil is pretty poor at retaining moisture. Still I normally water 3/8 inch per week on the restricted plan. Without the restrictions I would water 5/8 inch every 10 days because my grass can go that long before wilting. But sometimes during an extended drought where the humidity drops very low, I will need to water as much as 7/8 inch per week. This time of year we are watering every 2 weeks or maybe 3. The idea is to allow the soil time to dry out completely at the surface. When the surface is continually moist, then all the weed seeds in the soil will germinate. If the soil dries out, they will not germinate. If your neighbors are watering daily, they have "weed pressure" which they may be resolving with routine use of herbicides. Deep watering works to extend the time between watering. When the water is deeper in the soil, that cool soil is not prone to evaporation and will hold the moisture longer. The roots will realize this and grow down to capture that moisture deeper in the soil. This gives your grass much better tolerance to drought than grass watering only to a shallow depth. Every year we read about someone who went on vacation and their daily sprinkler controls failed. The entire lawn was wiped out overnight because they did not have deep roots developed. There is no magic formula for anyone. You'll have to work out a schedule for yourself. The concepts are as written above. Water deeply and watch the grass to see how long it goes before wilting. As soon as you see any of it wilting, then water it. If it was less than a week, then water longer right away. This time of year it was shorter than 2 weeks, then water longer NOW. If you have problems with water penetration, sometimes called hard or compacted soil, search this forum for the word shampoo and see what you find.

No, you probably won't notice the little things they got wrong. Instead, you'll notice the big things you got wrong, like not making the garage wider, not making the foyer deeper, etc. :-) This is the third house I've had built for me. The first was basically a spec house with a very few minor changes. The second was semi-custom (spec house with more substantial changes). The third was fully custom (architected plan). By the time the third, fully custom house was being built, I knew that no amount of advance planning or attention during the build was ever going to result in a perfect house. You try to get the "bones" as right as you can, and get it built in a quality manner, and then resign yourself to all the little (and sometimes big) things that either you overlooked, or didn't anticipate exactly how they would look / interact in the completed house. Tell yourself the following: If anything really, truly bugs you, it's "merely a matter of money" to fix it. Unless we're talking about impossible structural changes (like, deciding you wanted to build with ICF walls rather than stick-built -- and you're not talking about that), you can make it "right" later, if you really wish. I suspect in a few weeks or months, you won't think twice about those particular goofs. And if still you do, you can fix them. It's "merely a matter of money". :-) --Steve

there is a plant propogation book i have wherein the author describes his own mist system. that author has a large black coil of hose in the roof of his greenhouse so that water can be heated before reaching the mist nozzles. that's at least one vote for using warm water and keeping the cuttings reasonably warm as they root. just thought i would toss that in! lol. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by: mosaic z8 LA (My Page) on Sun, May 11, 03 at 11:59 With such a setup you could probably root roses under mist all winter here in Louisiana. And then as an added bonus, you could save on your power bills all summer by using it to steam your veggies :) -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by: tammyinwv z6/WV (My Page) on Sun, May 11, 03 at 16:05 i have been unable to find the mist heads even within an hr from my home.Someone mentioned here they found them for .50 each.would anyone be willing to get me a couple and mail them? -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by: wild_garden virginia z6b (My Page) on Sun, May 11, 03 at 16:32 at my lowes store the mist heads where in the indoor gardening area next to the register, i doubt the people at lowes would have even know what to look for. it was with the drip irrigation supplies, as i said in the indoor gardening area next to the big outdoor area where they sell trees and things. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Mist heads supply source Posted by: RoseHawke 7b AL (My Page) on Mon, May 12, 03 at 10:37 For you folks that haven't been able to find the heads locally, try going to this site: Dripworks or here's a direct link to one of the pages with some heads:Misters . I just a couple of weeks ago ordered some irrigation supplies from them and received them quite quickly. About 4 days if I remember correctly. Haven't had a chance to put it together yet, which is probably just as well as the flood we had last week would've probably washed everything down the creek ;-). I also have the Melnor timer, and it does seem a bit confusing about its ability to do a mist cycle, but what you're doing is programing it to do one cycle (on in the am; off in the pm) and punching in a choice of watering pattern, in this case the off for 10" on for 2" pattern. I believe the idea behind the pattern was/is actually to help prevent water run-off when doing overhead watering by allowing the water to soak in between the on phases. I bought this particular timer though because when I looked at it my mind said "Ah! Mist!" (heh), even though the reason I bought it at the time was to keep a new patch of zoysia sod watered until it rooted in. My batteries did last all season last year, but it was only opening that valve 4x a day for 3 weeks, and then 1x every 4 days for a couple of months. I can see where a misting pattern of opening and closing that valve many times during the day may eat batteries, but as ShamanSherpa pointed out, it's still cheaper than a $100+ misting timer! -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by: patclem z7 (or 6) TN (My Page) on Fri, May 23, 03 at 8:32 Regardless of how much water it wastes, etc, I decided to experiment with misting. I am TERRIBLE at rooting cuttings. I've tried baggies. I've tried jars. I've tried special cutting trays with plastic domes. I've had one rooted cutting out of probably 50. I had the same problem finding true super-fine mist systems in the south. None at Lowe's, none at HD. They're not popular here because they don't have the same evaporating effect they have in less humid areas of the country - they make you wet here. Here's where I found mist heads. They didn't charge me anything for shipping. They were super-good to deal with online. Web Page - Phone/Fax 888-693-0578 Local/Fax (719) 495-2266 Qty: 4; Sku: 6W401; Product: Monarch Misting Nozzles M-1; Amount: $7.40 Qty: 4; Sku: 6W519; Product: Reducing Tee for Monarch Misting Nozzles; Amount: $4.40 You have to go to Lowe's or local hardware store and get a hose adapter, timers, 1/2" PVC, PVC caps, etc. I have mine set up with 2 mist heads, and about a 6' diameter section of my grass is soaked! I don't have mine on a timer yet. Results? I don't have any yet, except none of my cuttings have turned black yet. PS - I AM NOT AFFILIATED WITH THIS BUSINESS IN ANY WAY! Here is a link that might be useful: Mist Heads -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by: fuselighter 7/WA (My Page) on Thu, May 29, 03 at 21:41 I am so excited about the misting bed. I went out and bought all the supplies today. Total cost was about $15 (my husband had PVC and elbows left over from installing the sprinkler system). I would like to go to an intermittent system eventually, but for now I am going with continuous. The water bill is not an issue because we have an irrigation system (there is an annual fee but it is not based on usage). I set the whole thing up in about an hour. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by: debbinard Z4CO (My Page) on Sun, Jun 1, 03 at 10:54 Shamansherpa -- I could not open your picture! I live in Colorado, it gets very warm middle of June (up to upper 90's) and stays low humidity. We are on outsidewater restrictions 2xweek, so I'm not sure this method would fly. Am wondering how visible this is, or if inside is an option under lights. At any rate, I would like to propigate some rose cuttings now (is this a good time?) My daughter in law is moving and would love some plants from a rose with sentimental value. Is the rooting hormone used just the usual or special for roses? Thanks Deb -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by: mytrid Zone8b Florida (My Page) on Sun, Jun 1, 03 at 13:48 Deb, Maybe you could call your water extention office and see if you can get special permission, exsplain to them how little water it uses. Yes you use rooting hormone, there are many available. Dip and grow I here is supposed to be really good. I got some of the more exspensive stuff from a friend whom bought it threw rose imporium on line. But you can always use something like dip and grow. Deanna -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by: rose_enthusiast z7 TX. (My Page) on Sun, Jun 1, 03 at 15:47 Hi there Deanna! It seems to me you've managed to help a lot of people with your invaluable info. And I would like to thank you for inspiring me to start a misting bed to root my cuttings. I have one question to add to the many others you've been getting though... What rose company is it that you get your rooting hormone from? Is it Rose Emporium or the Antique Rose Emporium? I would like to purchase this product as well, since you and this company are using this to successfully root your cuttings. Thanks Again, Carlos -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by: mytrid Zone8b Florida (My Page) on Tue, Jun 3, 03 at 1:31 Carlos, Thank you but we should all thank AngieAnders, she is the one who did all the research and work to discover this method and then post it here for us last year! She truly diserves all the credit. I just wanted to keep any new people aware that have just started rooting this year. Best of luck all and don't forget to post your sucess! Deanna -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by: epiphany z5b PA (My Page) on Tue, Jun 3, 03 at 9:28 I found the Arizona Mist system which is by Orbit as mentioned at Wal-Mart. It has 12' of tubing, end cap, six misting heads and hose adapter for $14.95. Of course, it is once again cold and wet here,......all of a balmy 56°. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Posted by: auntnana 6 TN (My Page) on Thu, Jun 5, 03 at 13:06 I ordered the misting heads mentioned above from Dripworks last year and they don't put out a fine mist as much as they do a fine spray/droplets. And even though I had a pressure regulator on there, I kept having a problem with the heads blowing off! (Their drippers work perfectly by the way so it's nothing against the company) I ordered foggers from Misty Mate this year and they put out a super fine fog. Perfect for propagation. They are a litte more expensive than the ones from Dripworks but worth it. And if you ask they will ship the misting heads for $1.50. I went to HD and bought a 10-24 tap and drill set (3.00) and drilled holes in my 1/2" cvpvc and the heads just screwed right in! I bought a Melnor timer at HD for $39 and it has 1 minute spray options so I've got it set for 1 minute every 10 minutes. Can't remember the model number but it's not the one on the HD website. I hope to finish my new propagation box soon. I built one on a stand this year so I can move it around easily. Wouldn't you know, HD has plastic sheeting made just for greenhouses that I used! It's not the real thick heavy stuff either. It's only 4mil and is crystal clear see-thru! Hopefully I'll be finished this week!