Begonia, Repeat after me_I AM NOT SCARED!!! I swear plants know when you are afraid of them and will take every advantage to die on you. Confidence!!! Now on to your questions: Your soil mix is appropriate for wicking. Some people use a thinner wick for smaller plants and vice-versa. I do not. I like my reservoir go dry for a day or so before I re-fill it to let my plants dry a bit. If the plants become too dry, watering from the top will get the wick going again. You will have to experiment but as you are a confident plant person this will not scare you. Just stick your finger in the soil-if it's soaking, it's too wet but I don't think you'll have this problem. (Spraying the stem is unnecessary but not harmful). And you will have to pat your soil in somewhat. Just don't go at it like you're punching down bread dough. You do not need fancy grow lights. Go to HD and get a warm white and a cool white. Your fixture should have a reflector. (I have been using this combination since 1972.) I think the warm is labeled daylight or sunshine. If you want the reason for this, let me know. It's rather lengthy and it's very late so...you'll just have to trust me. (I can also rhapsody for quite a while on soil mixes in case you are interested). But...I digress...) I replace when my tubes get a dark ring around the ends, (very noticeable) or when growth and blooming start to slow. Be careful with new tubes. They are very strong in the beginning. As you have learned, plants of a genera are not all the same . Each cultivar and even each individual is different and will respond differently to your growing conditions. Just follow good AV growing practices and don't be afraid to experiment. And don't be discouraged when you lose some. We all lose some. Some plants are just naturally weak, some won't like you or your conditions and some are just suicidal. Just chalk it up to experience and move on. A plant that dies gives you room for something new! I have been at this plant business my entire life and there are still violets that refuse to bloom for me. Ex: Gillian. Grows like a weed. Will not bloom. I don't obsess over these non-bloomers. I give them to my neighbor and let her obsess. Instead of individual containers-why don't you get a tray-the kind annuals come in-with no holes. Add egg-crate and place your plants on this with the wicks extending through the egg-crate. This takes care of humidity (Question 4) and you won't have to figure out what containers to use (Question 5). It also makes it much easier to care for your plants when they are all together and all you have to do is water the tray. Let me know if you have more questions! Linda

This is a great thread. Karaoke Quilterswhat fun! I was about to say you can add me to the list of readers, but then I remembered the stack pile of books overflowing the coal bucket next to my bed......books I've bought but haven't yet read. So I guess you can add me to the list of book buyers. I love books and love to read, but I don't spend as much time at it as I used to. I do, however, keep an audio book, usually a mystery, in my car at all times. In winter I love old-fahioned rug hooking, the kind that uses strips of cloth cut from old woolen clothing. My current project is a table mat I started in 1997. (I took a long hiatus from hooking.) It shows the seven cats we had at the time, the ones we were always telling to "get off the table!" I grew up in my dad's darkroom, and love photography. I swore I'd never get a digital camera (silly me), but that went by the boards when I worked as a newspaper reporter/photographer and had to process my own film. When we switched to digital, that was that. I'll link to my Flickr page below. I inherited my dad's photos, negatives, and slides, and bought a sophisticated scanner with the intention of digitizing some of his work. The prospect of the learning curve has me somewhat paralyzed, though. I suppose one of these days I'll plug it in . . . When my kids were growing up we had a huge vegetable garden and I spent endless hours freezing and canning and drying and cooking. I made three meals a day from scratch every day. But I loved it. I also sewed a lot of their clothes, and some of mine, and did crafts with them all the time. I can't imagine having that much energy! Well, I know I never will again. These days I'm cooking for one, and it isn't nearly as much fun. I do have the occasional creative spurt in the kitchen, but not often. I would still love to bake, but like someone else who posted, I have to limit carbs so that's out. I enjoy blogging. I'm not skilled at genealogy, but I love to poke around the Internet looking for bits and pieces of family information. In that way, I managed to trace one line back to around 1720. Because I was so moved to see the gravestones of two of my great-great-grandparents on the Internet, and grateful to whomever took those pictures, I volunteered at Random Acts of Genealogical Kindness to photograph gravestones in my rural area. I received my first assignment last week. I've belonged to a poetry group since the late 1980s, and although these days the focus of my writing is prose, rather than poetry, I'm still active with the group. In fact, I'm organizing an event to take place this week, and the Scranton paper published a small interview with me about it this morning. Here's the online version. Amazing how many things trump housework! Here is a link that might be useful: my Flickr photos

As I age, my hobbies change. Some on here will remember how Cactus & Succulent crazy I was for years... pretty much gone. I moved in 2004 and my microclimate changed drastically. So I had to change what I grew. Orchids became more prevelant, which devolved into mostly Oncidiums and Cymbidium orchids! The microclimate involved many more epiphytics, AND there was a YARD involved so more in ground gardening and less container gardening. In 2007 my career changed paths (totally UNEXPECTED paths) and I've been learning a whole new industry since then. May of this year saw me promoted into a Manager position, in a one person office, so it is All Me. (That sucks up way more of my time than I like.) Read (less than I used to) Compost Have four cats Have had my Class M California license for more than 25 years and have been more actively riding my trike (Brothers of the Third Wheel have been featured in several Major publications this year) Got sucked into Farm games on a well known social network Photograph my beautiful plants, at a near professional level Lost a dear pet suddenly and needed a new hobby to keep my hands busy, and my lap full... so I started designing and crafting jewelry. (Yep, that's pretty much where I've been.) You can see it here http://www.artfire.com/users/The_Clockwork_Boudoir Not to mention a recent introduction to Steampunk... Just what I need, a new hobby! I've developed a more sophisticated musical palette thanks to my 24 yo son, and will be attending a Black Keys concert on my 50th birthday... Wondering if I'm in crisis territory?

Well not quite a newbie, but IÂll bite. IÂve always been the artistic type and every job IÂve ever had was luckily a creative one. Window displays, photo styling, fashion productionÂthen I got married, had 2 wonderful little munchkins, bought our first (and only so far) house and became a stay at home mom. I didnÂt know an Oak tree from a Rhododendron when we first moved in about 16 years ago. So that gratefully gave me something new to learn. I was closing in on my last bit of patience with Barney the purple dinosaur and the Ninja Turtle dudes. So I learnedÂand learnedÂand learnedÂbecame a Master Gardener , volunteered a lot , was hired as a Hort Manager then left after a few years to start my own design business. In the meantime the kids grew. My oldest was graduating from high school and we still had the old original bathroom that came with the houseÂand IÂm talkin OLD. So I was introduced to the wonderful world of tileÂooooooÂaaaahhhhhh. Then glass tile! There was no stopping me at that point. Started the learning process all over again. Substrates and thinsets, caulk and grout. Finished the glass bathroom, floor to ceiling and in parts ceilingÂI loved it! Then I put it all aside, seeing as the bathroom was finished and all. Then about a year later (last winter) I was hit with some strange medical stuffÂso now IÂm on MS watchÂyech. Perfectly fine so far, but thought that I may want to rethink this garden design stuff, plus working for other people was kinda taking all of the fun out of it. So I jumped right in. I had been on the Design forums here for awhile and eventually found you guys. This is where my mosaic story beginsÂ