I would stay away from plants which will spread via underground roots in a situation where you are gardening close a neighbour's property - unless you want to create the ultimate enemy. And since this neighbour is using round-up, by him/her spraying the stuff that comes in their yard, you could have a real battle on your hands. Do a search Pasychandra and Goutweed. You will find that both are considered invasive, the Goutweed more so than the Pasychandra. In terms of the Goutweed, after established, removing it becomes a task that takes years. If you so much as leave one little tiny piece of root in the ground, it will take. Snuffing it with 18 inches of mulch and cardboard and landscape fabric won't work either. Ask my neighbour... Goutweed can also cause skin irritations. I'll second the mulching idea. If you are concerned that the mulch will be eroded by the rain, place some rocks here and there. If you have some compost which is just partially finished, that would be great - the worms will move in and start working your clay soil. Shredded leaves are also a blessing in such and area. I would start with hostas. They are tough beautiful plants and they will grow in clay. Next spring, I would plant some nice ferns - Cinnamon Ferns and such. As the soil becomes easier to work with since the mulching will give it more organic matter and make it nice, you can start adding Columbines, Thalictrum, Bleeding Heart, Astilbes, etc. In regards to the neighbour, you might try talking to them. Maybe offer to take care of the area yourself, suggesting a mulched area. All you'd really have to do is put down some cardboard and then place about a foot of bark mulch on top. Throughout the summer, just monitor the area for the occasional weed... It would be nice if you could have some of the small spindly trees removed... But that's a DH issue which I won't touch. LOL!! :O)

Here's one of our sad Heuchera with an equally sad hyacinth: But then if you just turn around on the left you'll have a bunch of darling tulips getting ready to announce themselves: and on the right are irises, which look like onions right now but they'll be coming around: Where the boxwoods now are I'd had daphnes, but they were never happy so the helpful man at the nursery and I decided to just go with the boxwoods. The green mounds in back are hollyhocks -- love them! One didn't make it, but the rest look pretty happy which makes me look pretty happy as well! At the base of the (aspen) tree dead ahead are the sad heuchera. A teeny fraction of our daffodils -- aren't they just the happiest flower? I've a few hundred of them strewn across the front of the yard, bordering the sidewalk. Planting them I think I used many, many swear words -- it was so frustrating in this soil! But now that I look at that them I think "Totally worth it!" Hopefully I can remember that when it's planting time in the fall .... The fluffy brown in between them are the ice plants, two junipers (hated junipers when I lived in CA but now I'm grateful for their evergreen nature) and a hole where a third juniper was but a wind blew away. The leggy twiggy brown on the right is a rose. I think grape hyacinths are so darn cute! But I think I made a mistake in where I planted them -- should've been right next to the walkway, where the disappointing heuchera and hyacinths are! (although in all fairness to the hyacinths, they did beautifully last year and I suspect if not for our crazy weather they might've been "better" this year) There are columbines in there as well -- what a pretty flower. Because the tulips I'd planted our first autumn here (first photo) did so well and were so beautiful, I thought I'd plant more. I'm glad I did, and seeing them get ready makes me want to plant even more! And today, as I went out in that biting wind to take these pictures (Li'l Bit's [my two year-old] napping and El Guapo [my four year-old] is seriously involved with his Lego project) I couldn't believe it -- there was a lone red tulip! El Guapo's been complaining yet here one is! I've always loved peonies. Always. I planted three in our front yard but I believe two of them (in a different section) didn't make it. I'm sad. But, when I was out front on Saturday (four days ago) there was the teeniest green nubbin poking its way through the mulch and today it is three inches high! How insane is that? So I'll cross my fingers but not hold my breath about the other two .... There was a horrible wind last summer which ripped the other two peonies and my across-the-street neighbor's large peony got wiped out as well. I didn't take any pictures of the backyard, but the blue mists I planted are all showing their sweet microscopic green leaves. There's one h-u-g-e blue mist in the backyard which we inherited, and it clearly was never cut back. I know you're supposed to cut them back in the spring but it's so big it makes it a bit difficult to tell what's coming to life and what's twiggy and / or dead. So I think I'll wait until it's "back" and then cut out the twiggy / dead parts. After I see what it's doing I'll undoubtedly come back to ask how to get it back in fighting form. Isn't it so fun to see the green poking its way through to show us spring is on its way? I love it!

Ok, here are my newest "baby" pictures, these were planted on April 12, and just sprouted the 16th. Cherokee Chocolate was the first to come up, with an Aker's West Virginia in the back right cell and a Crnkovic Yugoslavian beginning to peep above the starting mix in the back left (it was planted the 13th, from 6 year old seeds, so it is a "go getter"). The one in the cell at the right edge of the picture is a Brandywine. The two in the back left cell of the tray in the back are Julia Childs. This little Julia Child seems to be a bit confused. These peppers were planted a week earlier but also sprouted yesterday. So far Aunt Ginny's Purple, Yellow Brandywine, Shuntukski Giant, and Olena Ukrainian have also sprouted out of the 40+ varieties I have planted. Still waiting for the other cells in the 6 packs to sprout. Now that I have more space in the flat that is on the heat mat, I'll be planting more tomatoes over the next few days and will do some cherry tomatoes last. I was wondering if I had started these too late, but they should all be about 6 weeks when we plant out around Memorial day. BTW, we had 3"+ of snow on Wednesday the 15th. Just a typical late spring last hurrah (I hope) for this area. Bets

Hi Pavani - I'll try to answer a couple of your questions. i am afraid that they can't withstand the heat without watering at least alternate days. Should i water alternate days? or should i water very deep like 5-10 minutes each plant twice a week? Water isn't really what allows them to withstand the heat. It is the soil temps around the roots. So yes, definitely mulch the plants heavily. It will help retain moisture and keep the roots cooler. I use about 6-8" of hay. Straw is great too and it will also help with the too shallow planting. Next year plant them to just below the lowest set of leaves. You might also think about making some sort of sun screen or temporary shade to keep them from cooking on the vine in the hot Houston July sun. It could help from what many of the other Texas growers say. As to watering, deeper and less often is best but I don't think 5-10 minutes is all that deep - go longer 2x a week. It all depends on how you are applying it. The best clue as to their need is stick your finger as deep as possible into the soil near the plant. If it is at all damp, don't water. When in doubt, don't water. Tomatoes will tolerate being too dry much better than they will if too wet. BIG GREEN?BROWNISH WORM Big green is usually hornworms - you can find pics of them on the web. Brown is usually tomato fruit worms. Pics of them also available. The hornworms eat the fruit and leaves. The brown just the fruit. Can't tell you which it is without seeing it but you need to pin down which they are. Most of us just hand pick them off - that is the most organic method. With only a few plants that shouldn't be a problems. Otherwise, Bt (bacillus thuringesis) sold as Dipel (dust or liquid) will control both. It too is approved for organic use. i pinched/cut off some of the smaller branches from all the plants so that they won't be crowded and do get enough air circulation which might prevent fungs diseases. Did i do the right thing? That's fine. You can remove leaf branches below and around the bloom clusters with no problem. Check out the FAQ's here on pruning (FAQ link on the forum from page). But get too carried away or the Texas sun will scald the fruit as they develop. Keep some leaf shade over them. Should i be fertilizing the tomatoes bi-weekly throughout the season? You'll get many different opinions on this one. ;) Some do but I think I am safe in saying that most do not. Too much fertilizer causes problems. All I can tell you is what I do. I feed well when I plant with a good time-released dry fertilizer mixed in the planting hole. Then again mid-season after we pick the first ripe fruit I do a good root drench feeding. Depending on the weather, one more time around mid-August I feed the roots so the plants will keep going till frost. In between times I will do some foliar feeding sprays with very weak compost tea. Experiment a bit on your plants and see which works best for you. Hope this helps. Enjoy your tomatoes. Dave