I have to name several! Each, in its moment of perfection, is a rose to make one gasp and let the eye linger upon in pleasure. 'Better Times' is probably my favorite; the coloration and form of the flower, and the way the color of the foliage complements the flower's color, makes the opening of each blossom an event. Its sport-sibling 'Briarcliff' is splendid as well. The HMF photos don't really capture the purplish-blue tone of the magenta red of 'Better Times'; the wonderful moire effect of 'Briarcliff' can be detected in some of the HMF photos, though. 'Snowbird' is wonderful in every way. 'Peach Beauty' is impressively beautiful when opening and for a day or two after (it then gets forgivably blowsy). 'Marceline' has a perfection of form and elegance of coloration which is striking. The HMF pix don't quite capture it. 'Maman Lyly' is breathtaking in form, changing coloration, and fragrance. 'Chrysler Imperial' will always be my favorite red rose. The various Radiances, eh (shrugs), I used to be enthusiastic about them; now, not so much. I like them because they're tough, and because the various colors of the varieties complement each other beautifully (I have them all next to each other). The much-praised fragrance is rather too citrusy for me (same, to my nose, with 'La France'). For me, the best of them is the original, 'Radiance', with its attractive contrast of colors; and the color of 'Mrs. Charles J. Bell' is particularly beautiful when beside magenta and purplish-red roses (mine is near a 'Pergolese'). But, I ramble...

I love my hybrid willows as farm trees. Pennsylvania deer are not interested in them, and as advertised, they grow three to six feet per year! I am so happy we planted them, as they are in their third year and the most vigorous are already about ten feet tall. I planted them along my pasture fence line, in an area that is always "squishy" and wet. Their aggressive roots have soaked up a lot of that water, making the area more stable, and my horses don't bother them. The branches are dense enough to provide a minor windbreak even in the winter, and in the summer they provide a lot of privacy from the road. Behind them, I planted some firs that will take 10-20 years to grow big enough to provide privacy. I've heard that the hybrid willows can only be expected to live about 20 years, which is fine, because by then my firs will have grown tall enough to replace them. I would echo what others have said about not planting hybrid willows in a small yard, or anywhere near a septic -- 100' away at least. The roots will bust through anything they contact.

Oh the minute I saw "Monsanto" I knew where this was going. I have been a Monsanto boycotter since I read about Aspertame, the poison they have spread for 2 decades now.Then I read about their Roundup resistant raspseed (Canola) and the farmer they sued...What scoundrels. They are in the same society downgraders like Wal Mart. Yes, I have my tin foil hat on. Ok now for real world.I am not heirloom snob. I do grow some Hybrids only for insurance...in case my Heirs fail. But to only get 2 tomatoes on a plant. PUHLEASE! Did they measure the nitrogen in each plant's soil? Just a thought and I did not go to college and have no "scientific" degree. Pathetic pandering for Monsanto.

what commercial supplier of heirloom seeds would you recommend? **** My experience is not as a customer b'c I think I've only purchased less than 30 packs of seed since maybe 1982, LOL, after I moved back East from teaching in Denver at the Med School, and back then, roughly before 1990 it was Seeds Blum and Gleckers and both are out of business, although I've been up close and personal with tomatoes since I was a kid back on the farm and I'll be 69 in June. Triple Sigh. But I've been posting online about tomatoes since 1989 and seen lots of feedback and I do know the owners of most of the more common seed sources. And most helpful was several years ago when here at GW I started Wrong varieties threads and there was a tremendous amount of feedback. And I continue to monitor these issues at the four places where I do read/post. There are several factors that go into choosing commercial sources and they include seeds that are true, seed age/viability, quality of information given about varieties, kinds of varieties offered, service, and seed prices, to name a few. it really does bother me when with any given variety when source A charges $2 for a pack of 30 while source B charges $4, all other factors being somewhat equal. And it really does bother me as well when some folks are attracted to a slick website and ignore what's really important as to all the variables I mentioned above. And no source selling OP varieties has a perfect record on seed purity just b'c of the nature of OP seed production. I also don't think it's critical that a site have pictures of varieties although it's fine if they do. With those caveats I'd suggest the following, somewhat in order: Tomatogrowers.com ( Linda Sapp) SandhillPreservation.com ( Glenn and Linda Drowns) Victoryseeds.com ( Mike Dunton) SSE Public catalog varieties ( seedsavers.org) (Aaron Whaley) Marianne Jones at Mariseeds.com Baker Creek, (rareseeds.com) ( Jere Gettle) Heirloom seeds ( in PA, heirloomseeds.com) ( Tom Hauch) And yes I do know all of the folks mentioned above and have interacted with all of them in one way or another, whether it's sending them varieties for trial or for some as fellow SSE members of yore, etc) And with those above there are close to a couple of thousand varieties available. If anyone wants to go beyond the more commonly offered varieties they should consider joining SSE, not just for requesting seeds from listed SSE members, and there's often a problem there in seed purity so folks should darn well know how to rogue out wrong plants and that comes solely from experience, from the Yearbook where about 4000 varieties are offered, but to help SSE with their mission of seed preservation in general. Lousy run on sentence but I'm sure you get my drift. ( smile) Every one of the above has had problems at one time or another with wrong varieties and/or low germinating seed, except for Sandhill where no seed sold is older than 2 years old, which to me is quite remarkable since Glenn lists about 400 varieties. And I should say that of late Totally Tomatoes has done a much better job but some wrong descriptions still bother me a lot. But they (Jungs) inherited blurbs from the previous owner Wayne Hilton and there are still lots of errors but it looks like most of the seeds are fine these days. I know Gary Ibsen at Tomatofest very well but I do have problems with seed prices there. Yes, I know he sells only organic seed but to me organicness is gained in how one GROWS the plants re edible fruits, not with organic seed per se which to me is more of a personal philosophy statement. Just my personal opinion. But to each his or her own. I'm hearing some good things about Skyfire seeds but don't know them as well. And for sure there are others but you asked me which ones I'd suggest to others as sources to maybe start with and right now I've listed those above. Finally, I've said it before and I'll say it again, each person should know the basic traits of every variety they sow seeds for BEFORE they sow the seeds. And that means plant habit, ind or det, leaf form, PL or RL, fruit color and size and shape. That's the ONLY way that a person will know if the variety they have is correct and it sure would stop a lot of wrong varieties from being traded, which happens quite a bit. Of course the possibility of cross pollination should also be recognized and there's an excellent FAQ on that here at GW, just click on the FAQ at the top of the page and scroll down. Carolyn, who has also decided to stay positive and NOT list the sources she would NOT recommend to others. Sigh.