I make sure to use water that has sat out overnight to water my plants. Does that not make a difference? Or not enough of a difference? You already learned that the crystalline structures on the leaves of your plant is composed of dissolved solids (sugar and mineral salts) left behind as the water in the exudate associated with the guttation (primarily driven by over-watering) evaporates. If you allow your water to rest overnight in an open pan, some of the water in the pan evaporates, but ALL of the dissolved solids in the water are left behind, So technically, the concentration of dissolved solids in the water (which includes fluoride, and chloramine, used now to chlorinate most tapwater) would be slightly higher than water straight from the tap. The pH of water straight from the tap is also slightly lower than water that has rested for a period of time, due to dissolved CO2 gassing off. Also yes, can you point me in the direction of drain hole tutorials?? I'm guessing you mean how to drill the holes? This should help: Drilling holes in pots The 2 types of drill bits most appropriate for drilling holes in pots are a diamond core drill for the highly vitrified (hard material - baked at very high temps - glass, ceramic, ......) pots, and a drill with several names for drilling clay pots fired at low temps, such as terra cotta. That (carbide) drill is called a 3-point drill, spear point drill, or a spade drill, seen here: You only need 1 - in 1/2 or 3/8" size. For the hard stuff, diamond core drills are best, though the 3 point drill will drill the hard stuff, too. Diamond core drills: You can buy either type at big box stores. They're not that expensive, and they last a long time if you take care of them. They are best used with a steady stream of coolant from a squeeze bottle (contact lens solution bottles work great for this) or with the work surface barely submerged. IE, put the pot upside down in a tub and fill the tub with water until it just covers the work surface. If you use a spritzer or squirt bottle, a 50/50 mix of antifreeze and water is an excellent coolant, and soapy water is better than plain water but not as good as the antifreeze mix. The coolant keeps the tool from over-heating, and in doing so, increases the life of the tool substantially - like triple or quadruple the number of holes you can drill. Regular masonry bits are "ok" for drilling terra cotta or cement (you can make them work), but inappropriate for anything harder. The right tool makes everything easier. And lastly, should I be flushing all my plants (pothos, croton, aloe, snake plant...) when I water? One way or another - YES, absolutely. Ideally, your choice of soil should allow you to water to beyond the point of saturation, so you're flushing the soil as you water. If you can't do that w/o worry that the soil will remain soggy for a prolonged period, limiting root function, or worse, wrecking root health it would be best to consider learning how to amend the soil you're using or make a soil that allows you to flush the soil regularly. There are also a few very simple work-arounds that will allow you to use a soil that would otherwise be inappropriate. For example - if you're using a soil too water-retentive for a plant's well-being, and you need to flush it - you can flush thoroughly over a sink or tub or outdoors. When the pot stops draining, hold it in your hand(s) and move it up and down. You'll note that on the reversal from downward to upward motion, Newton's First Law of Motion takes over and some of the excess water in the pot exits through the drain hole. As the amount of water diminishes, more can be forced from the soil by reversing directions more forcibly. As long as your pot is of a manageable size, this simple trick is invaluable for anyone using an excessively water-retentive soil. If the pot is too large, you can use a wick to drain excess water, or even tipping the pot at a 45* angle to drain makes a very significant difference in how much excess water a medium can hold. Compare B with A to see how much excess water the simple act of tipping the pot forces from the pot. E shows what a wick, used correctly for best benefit, can achieve. D shows one way of using ballast to reduce excess water. Even when using extremely water retentive soils, ballast can reduce the amount of excess water a soil can hold to less than 5% of what it would hold w/o use of ballast. Al

overproduction is called a mast year : https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffcm&q=mast+year&ia=web it can be.. but not always... is the year AFTER some weather event... very cold winter... drought.. etc .. as the flowers bloom before the drought .... it wouldnt be adverse to the nut production the year of teh drought .. inartful english there.. hope you can figure what i mean ... https://duckduckgo.com/?q=oak+flowers&t=ffcm&iax=images&ia=images perhaps mary is not mowing her grass often enough ... perhaps dont wait until the grass is tall enough.. and just keep mowing the trees .. if you keep cutting off the leaves.. soon or later.. the tree will use up stored energy..and die ... ken

Jen, We are having the same weather issues...i do think that it does have some effect on the trees that i have. Im constantly trying to figure out why my leaves are having issues. I used the 3 & 1 spray too! I think the strong sun and intense heat are playing a large part in my problems... today we had record temps at 102 with the heat index at 118* Way to Hot.... I hope your trees will continue to produce inflos...they look great and healthy!!! Take care Jen!!! Laura in VB

"...cindylou, imagine if you can what it would be like after all you and your husband have experienced with your MIL if your own children grew up and estranged you..." If I had a child who estranged me, I would not think it had anything to do or not to do with my MIL. I would not think that they owed me a relationship because I tolerated my MIL (maybe I misunderstood what you meant by connecting my MIL into that idea). If my child estranged me suddenly and with no warning and if I asked and they said, "You know", and I truly didn't, I would make the assumption they didn't quite didn't know themselves. That they have feelings and upsets they don't quite understand themselves and that they needed time away from me to work them out. (This is assuming there's no mental illness or addiction. If there is mental illness or addiction, then I do know and frankly, maybe I'm just getting too old, but I've seen the hopelessness and heartache of addiction and mental illness, and I think I'd just be grateful for being cut out). More likely, I would have been told the answer. And I'd accept it, even if it didn't make sense. "Because you wore blue to my kindergaren graduation." Huh? Ok. I don't think I'd argue. I can't imagine arguing with an adult child. They are an adult. I barely argue with them now. My parents didn't argue with me, I never saw them argue with their parents. My aunts and uncles on both sides didn't argue with either their adult children or their parents. It's just not done. I can't imagine it. There are differences of opinion and hurt feelings and misunderstandings and on rare occasions, conflict between adult members of my extended family. Of course there is. But everyone seems to understand a basic rule. I live my life and you live yours, and I can offer my opinion and it's fair if you don't follow it. The person who's business it is, gets the final say. The person who has the most responsibility gets to decide. The person who takes the biggest risk chooses. We are none of us perfect people; but we don't squabble and manipulate and gang up on each other and form one alliance and then another to force family members to do what we want. And we don't stab each other in the back. That's such a bizarre concept to me. And we are very close--without melodrama. There's not a lot of conflict. So if a child told me, "I don't want contact from you because you wouldn't let me go to Aruba on spring break." I'd respect that. I'd figure sooner or later they'd understand. Or if not, sooner or later it wouldn't matter any more. I would absolutely believe that eventually they'd come back. Not the way they were, it wouldn't be the same relationship, but had we stayed close, it wouldn't be the same relationship at 30 as it was at 20 or 10. Would I miss them and be hurt. You bet. But I'd be comforted that I would see them again and focus on the other blessings of my life while I waited. I truly believe that if you love something you let it go, and if it loves you, it will come back. And if it doesn't come back, you never had it to begin with. If after 10 or 20 years there was still no contact, I'd have to face the fact that it's probably for the best. We didn't have the relationship I thought we had; I didn't know them, and we obviously weren't a match even if they have half my DNA. Do I hope to have close, intimate relationships with the families of my adult children? Of course. But I will be happy with any non exploitive relationship my children feel comfortable with. I may want more contact or less, depending on the personalities, but perfection doesn't happen in relationships; it's like tension between togetherness and individuality that has to be worked out in a marriage. When your children are adults with families, you renegotiate your relationship, and if it REALLY doesn't work for someone, you might have to walk away. Sad, painful, but realistic. I have a coworker who is retiring and moving to be closer to her daughter and grandchildren. They are delighted to have her. On a recent house hunting trip she was dismayed that her daughter seemed to expect/demand a lot of babysitting from her. She's not moving there to take on the responsibility of babysitting her grandchildren, altho she does hope to see a lot of them and participate in their lives. Things were tense as she attempted to come to understanding with her daughter. She came back and asked if things don't work out in the other state, can she have her job back. I sometimes in the past had wondered if she's a meddling MIL so much does she talk about her grandchildren. But I see now she's got a life outside them and is not exploiting her daughter's family to fill the emptiness (if any) in her own life. And she's not going to allow herself to be exploited by her daughter however much she loves her family. She sees her standing up for herself may result in a cut off; and I respect her handling of this delicate situation. I'm sure it will all work out, but I can see myself in her place; in any relationship, there's always the possibility that you or the other person will walk away for whatever reason. You may think, oh yeah, you are so philosophical, just wait until it happens to you. Well, like anything, what choices do you have: you either accept with grace or you don't. How does not accepting with grace help anything? The ends don't justify the means. Bullying, manipulating, harassing, yelling...none of that is going to help. If you accept with grace, while you are waiting for the problem to resolve itself enough so the child talks to you again with a willingness to compromise, at least you can still have meaning and pleasure in your life. It also gives you time to reflect as well. It might not be that you did something WRONG, it's just that you don't mesh well. And you can measure in the absence how you and your adult child's family don't mesh and what you are willing to compromise to make the relationship more pleasant for EVERYONE. "Mom, you can never be unsupervised with my kids." "Why?" "Because you are a taurus". Huh? Well, that makes no sense to me. But why jeopardize my supervised visits with my grandchildren which can be wonderful by arguing if being a taurus prevents one from being a good grandma or not. Why fill that time with strife and anger and posturing and demands and righteousness and counter accusations when I can be on the floor playing Candyland and angling for the chocolate swamp or coloring in Barbie coloring books or stacking Lincoln logs as high as the sky. Who cares if DIL is glaring at me when my darling grandson and I are holding our breathes to see if we can make a Pixie Stix teepee? I believe letting them go gracefully gets them back eventually, and if it doesn't, the relationship would have just caused heartache all around anyway, estranged or not.