Virtually all organic fertilizers are, Ann. Dogs LOVE the stuff. Many also like Sluggo, the iron phosphate snail bait. One of mine goes nuts when he finds the stuff. He likes it as much as he likes the snails themselves. The other one prefers any poop she finds and all the "worm jerky" out front after the rains. Takes some real effort to police the area before they're allowed out! I can't use organics out back because the animal by products attract the coyotes, bob cats, raccoons while the plant by products attract every rodent, squirrel and rabbit for miles. Those attract SNAKES and all organics encourage earth worm activity and that brings more MOLES. Danged if I do, danged if I don't! Kim

Thank you ALL for the info. on potassium. I'm on the look-out for greensand and granite dust. The 7 gallons I received from Roses Unlimited had these shiny, silvery, metallic bits mixed in the soil. I don't know if they are granite dust, please inform. Hi LovemySheltie: Lowe's in Chicagoland sells Rose-Tone. Walmart sells Holly-tone. I prefer Holly-tone since our soil and water is alkaline, and Holly-tone has more calcium. My neighbor grows his tomato in a big pot, he has blossom-rot problem and has to use gypsum (calcium sulfate). I grow tomatoes in the ground - zero blossom-rot, but my limestone soil is barely adequate in calcium. Holly-tone says to use only 1 cup with peatmoss in the planting hole. NPK is 4-3-4, the below excerpt is from the Epsoma website: "Holly-tone, like all Espoma Tone products, provides 12 additional trace elements and micronutrients such as iron, calcium and magnesium. Holly-tone derives its 15 nutrients from organic ingredients including dehydrated manure, animal tankage, crab meal, cocoa meal, cottonseed meal, dried blood, sunflower meal, kelp, greensand, rock phosphate and sulfate of potash." My Holy-tone bag also lists alfalfa meal, and 3% calcium, 1% magnesium, and 2% sulfur - perfect for alkaline clay. My soil in Chicagoland is tested high in magnesium, but barely adequate in calcium. We are right next to a limestone quarry!

You may want to set up another tank, a 10 gallon, with shale or clay pots to breed the convicts. They are easy to breed and fun to watch them rear their young.

If you have trifoliate leaves, you have rootstock growing. Not the lime cultivar. 2" is just an arbitrary measurement. The graft line can be as low as the soil, or up the trunk even as far up as 12". What you want to look for and very clearly identify, is the graft line. Where the cultivar scion was grafted to the rootstock. Any shoots emanating from below that graft line will be rootstock. Any shoots emanating from above the graft will be the scion (your cultivar). If your rootstock was a trifoliate hybrid, you're going to see "leaves of three", hence the name "trifoliate". If you can provide some close up photos of the trunk at varying heights, we can try to see if we see a graft line. If I have time today, I can snap a few photos of my trees, and show you where the graft line is, and what to look for. For me, I think it is very obvious, but for someone new, it may not be. Patty S.