It's easy once you apply science and physics, per Al's articles and medium recipes. Key, I think, is getting past the old wive's tales and understanding that growing in the ground is very different than container growing, and that a 'green thumb' is nothing more than applied knowledge... it has nothing to do with luck or being fortunate... it's what we know about the plants and their needs, and adjusting the environment to suit them better, artificially or not. I struggled along until I read Al's article on container growing and moisture retention, and then it all clicked. Imagine that... I went through a good portion of life not really understanding the physics of it all, as simple as it is to grasp... or, as simple as Al made it to grasp! Add in the fact that the gardening industry is like any other, existing to make profit... and it all makes sense. It makes more sense to create my own medium for containers, to dive a little into educating myself on the plants I've chosen, etc... and to forget about the fallacies of yore, if you catch my drift. Now, I know what I need to do... and I can see the results! :-)

Thanks! It was an Ebay steal, so I'm not certain who the grower or supplier was... but the seller is in Michigan. The bulbs arrived via USPS Priority Mail, and were packed very nicely. I called the Post Office as soon as I knew they had been shipped, and she called me this morning to say the box was there! I picked it up right after lunch! I just finished potting it up, and it took a really large pot! Now for the recipes... I'm going to copy/paste the article and recipes in their entirety for anyone interested in the text that goes along with the recipes for Al's Mix... I must give credit where it's due... Tapla, or Al, is responsible for the article, the knowledge, and the mix. He's also responsible for many happy gardeners! Read on... Container Soils - Water Movement and Retention A Discussion About Soils As container gardeners, our first priority should be to insure the soils we use are adequately aerated for the life of the planting, or in the case of perennial material (trees, shrubs, garden perennials), from repot to repot. Soil aeration/drainage is the most important consideration in any container planting. Soil is the foundation that all container plantings are built on, and aeration is the cornerstone of that foundation. Since aeration and drainage are inversely linked to soil particle size, it makes good sense to try to find and use soils or primary components with particles larger than peat. That components retain their structure for extended periods is also extremely important. Pine and some other types of conifer bark fit the bill nicely and Ill talk more about them later. The following also hits pretty hard against the futility of using a drainage layer in an attempt to improve drainage. It just doesn't work. All it does is reduce the amount soil available for root colonization. A wick will remove water from the saturated layer of soil at the container bottom. It works in reverse of the self-watering pots widely being discussed on this forum now. Since there are many questions about soils appropriate for use in containers, I'll post basic mix recipes later, in case any would like to try the soil. It will follow the Water Movement info. Consider this if you will: Soil need fill only a few needs in plant culture. Anchorage - A place for roots to extend, securing the plant and preventing it from toppling. Nutrient Sink - It must retain sufficient nutrients in available form to sustain plant systems. Gas Exchange - It must be sufficiently porous to allow air to the root system and by-product gasses to escape. And finally, Water - It must retain water enough in liquid and/or vapor form to sustain plants between waterings. Most plants could be grown without soil as long as we can provide air, nutrients, and water, (witness hydroponics). Here, I will concentrate primarily on the movement of water in soil(s). There are two forces that cause water to move through soil - one is gravity, the other capillary action. Gravity needs little explanation, but for this writing I would like to note: Gravitational flow potential (GFP) is greater for water at the top of the container than it is for water at the bottom. I'll return to that later. Capillarity is a function of the natural forces of adhesion and cohesion. Adhesion is water's tendency to stick to solid objects like soil particles and the sides of the pot. Cohesion is the tendency for water to stick to itself. Cohesion is why we often find water in droplet form - because cohesion is at times stronger than adhesion, waterÂs bond to itself can be stronger than the bond to the object it might be in contact with; in this condition it forms a drop. Capillary action is in evidence when we dip a paper towel in water. The water will soak into the towel and rise several inches above the surface of the water. It will not drain back into the source. It will stop rising when the GFP equals the capillary attraction of the fibers in the paper. There will be a naturally occurring "perched water table" (PWT) in containers when soil particulate size is under about .125 (1/8) inch.. This is water that occupies a layer of soil that is always saturated & will not drain from the portion of the pot it occupies. It can evaporate or be used by the plant, but physical forces will not allow it to drain. It is there because the capillary pull of the soil at some point will surpass the GFP; therefore, the water does not drain, it is "perched". The smaller the size of the particles in a soil, the greater the height of the PWT. If we fill five cylinders of varying heights and diameters with the same soil mix and provide each cylinder with a drainage hole, the PWT will be exactly the same height in each container. This saturated area of the pot is where roots seldom penetrate & where root problems frequently begin due to a lack of aeration. Water and nutrient uptake are also compromised by lack of air in the root zone. Keeping in mind the fact that the PWT height is soil dependent and has nothing to do with height or shape of the container, we can draw the conclusion that: Tall growing containers will always have a higher percentage of unsaturated soil than squat containers when using the same soil mix. The reason: The level of the PWT will be the same in each container, with the taller container providing more usable, air holding soil above the PWT. Physiology dictates that plants must have oxygen at the root zone in order to maintain normal root function. A given volume of large soil particles has less overall surface area when compared to the same volume of small particles and therefore less overall adhesive attraction to water. So, in soils with large particles, GFP more readily overcomes capillary attraction. They drain better. We all know this, but the reason, often unclear, is that the height of the PWT is lower in coarse soils than in fine soils. The key to good drainage is size and uniformity of soil particles. Mixing large particles with small is often very ineffective because the smaller particles fit between the large, increasing surface area which increases the capillary attraction and thus the water holding potential. When we add a coarse drainage layer under our soil, it does not improve drainage. It does though, conserve on the volume of soil required to fill a pot and it makes the pot lighter. When we employ this exercise in an attempt to improve drainage, what we are actually doing is moving the level of the PWT higher in the pot. This simply reduces the volume of soil available for roots to colonize. Containers with uniform soil particle size from top of container to bottom will yield better and more uniform drainage and have a lower PWT than containers with drainage layers. The coarser the drainage layer, the more detrimental to drainage it is because water is more (for lack of a better scientific word) reluctant to make the downward transition because the capillary pull of the soil above the drainage layer is stronger than the GFP. The reason for this is there is far more surface area for water to be attracted to in the soil above the drainage layer than there is in the drainage layer, so the water "perches". I know this goes against what most have thought to be true, but the principle is scientifically sound, and experiments have shown it as so. Many nurserymen are now employing the pot-in-pot or the pot-in-trench method of growing to capitalize on the science. If you discover you need to increase drainage, you can simply insert an absorbent wick into a drainage hole & allow it to extend from the saturated soil to a few inches below the bottom of the pot, or allow it to contact soil below the container where it can be absorbed. This will successfully eliminate the PWT & give your plants much more soil to grow in as well as allow more, much needed air to the roots. Uniform size particles of fir, hemlock or pine bark are excellent as the primary component of your soils. The lignin contained in bark keeps it rigid and the rigidity provides air-holding pockets in the root zone far longer than peat or compost mixes that too quickly break down to a soup-like consistency. Conifer bark also contains suberin, a lipid sometimes referred to as natureÂs preservative. Suberin is what slows the decomposition of bark-based soils. It contains highly varied hydrocarbon chains and the microorganisms that turn peat to soup have great difficulty cleaving these chains. In simple terms: Plants that expire because of drainage problems either die of thirst because the roots have rotted and can no longer take up water, or they starve/"suffocate" because there is insufficient air at the root zone to insure normal water/nutrient uptake and root function. To confirm the existence of the PWT and the effectiveness of using a wick to remove it, try this experiment: Fill a soft drink cup nearly full of garden soil. Add enough water to fill to the top, being sure all soil is saturated. Punch a drain hole in the bottom of the cup & allow to drain. When the drainage stops, insert a wick into the drain hole . Take note of how much additional water drains. Even touching the soil with a toothpick through the drain hole will cause substantial additional water to drain. This is water that occupied the PWT before being drained by the wick. A greatly simplified explanation of what occurs is: The wick "fools" the water into thinking the pot is deeper, so water begins to move downward seeking the "new" bottom of the pot, pulling the rest of the water in the PWT along with it. If there is interest, there are other simple and interesting experiments you can perform to confirm the existence of a PWT in container soils. I can expand later. I remain cognizant of these physical principles whenever I build a soil. I havenÂt used a commercially prepared soil in many years, preferring to build a soil or amend one of my 2 basic mixes to suits individual plantings. I use many amendments when building my soils, but the basic building process starts with conifer bark and perlite. Sphagnum peat usually plays a minor, or at least a secondary role in my container soils because it breaks down too quickly and when it does, it impedes drainage and reduces aeration. Note that there is no sand or compost in the soils I use. Sand, though it can improve drainage in some cases, reduces aeration by filling valuable macro-pores in soils. Unless sand particle size is fairly uniform and/or larger than about ½ BB size I leave it out of soils. Compost is too unstable for me to consider using in soils. The small amount of micronutrients it supplies can easily be delivered by one or more of a number of chemical or organic sources. My Basic Soil I'll give two recipes. I usually make big batches. I also frequently add agricultural sulfur to some soils for acid-lovers or to soils I use dolomitic lime in. 5 parts pine bark fines 1 part sphagnum peat (not reed or sedge peat please) 1-2 parts perlite garden lime (or gypsum in some cases) controlled release fertilizer (if preferred) micronutrient powder, other continued source of micronutrients, or fertilizer with all minors Big batch: 2-3 cu ft pine bark fines 5 gallons peat 5 gallons perlite 2 cups dolomitic (garden) lime (or gypsum in some cases) 2 cups CRF (if preferred) 1/2 cup micronutrient powder (or other source of the minors) Small batch: 3 gallons pine bark 1/2 gallon peat 1/2 gallon perlite 4 tbsp lime (or gypsum in some cases) 1/4 cup CRF micro-nutrient powder (or other source of the minors) I have seen advice that some highly organic (practically speaking - almost all are highly organic) container soils are productive for up to 5 years or more. I disagree and will explain why if there is interest. Even if you were to substitute fir bark for pine bark in this recipe (and this recipe will long outlast any peat based soil) you should only expect a maximum of two to three years life before a repot is in order. Usually perennials, including trees (they're perennials too, you know) ;o) should be repotted more frequently to insure vigor closer to their genetic potential. If a soil is desired that will retain structure for long periods, we need to look more to inorganic components. Some examples are crushed granite, pea stone, coarse sand (see above - usually no smaller than ½ BB size in containers, please), Haydite, lava rock (pumice), Turface or Schultz soil conditioner, and others. Thank you for your interest. Al Fassezke

Tom: When I was a freshman in college I took an introductory course in logic, and the first thing the professor said was "post hoc, ergo propter hoc." Funny that I, who never studied Latin in school, should still remember this. The professor began his discussion of logical fallacies with this. Basically the idea is that people commonly ascribe a cause to something that happens before some supposed result, even though there may be no causal connection. This logical fallacy, he explained, causes an incredible amount of grief for mankind. In this case the observed root deformations, and the death of the trees, happened after the wire basket was placed around the root ball. But the does not mean that the wire basket caused the root deformations, or that the root deformations caused the death of the tree. In this case I can think of other things that could have caused, and in my mind, very probably could have caused the root deformations. First, of course, the roots were cut at the same margin where the basket was placed to enclose the root ball. Second, the tree may have been stored for a time in the wire basket before planting, causing the ends of the cut roots to die back from drying out at the surface of the root ball. Third, the roots would, naturally, reverse their direction and begin growing towards he moisture in the interior of the root ball, where there would be more moisture. This may look like the roots were somehow repelled by the wire, but in fact the cause was something else. Finally, the tree could have been planted in a soil that was very different form the soil from which the tree was dug, also affecting the growth of the roots out of the root ball and possibly causing them to grow even more unnaturally. The problem I have with the idea that the wire basket theory of root deformation, is that I canÂt identify anything about the wire that could cause this. Nothing I know about galvanized wire, and nothing I know about roots and how they grow, suggests any possibilities to me. I have not read any of the studies about this issue. I can imagine that any good study would have to control for a number of factors to ensure that what was discovered would be clearly an effect of the wire basket itself, and not other coincident factors.. When I have more time I will try to find out what I can about these studies. Maybe Nate could explain more about the study he cites and how it was designed and the factors that were controlled. I take the observations about the synthetic twine to be a separate issue. --Spruce

Your generalization is invalid, because we know with certainty that as the volume of roots in any given pot increases beyond the approximate point where the root/soil mass can be lifted from the pot intact, the top mass is not a reflection of root mass. As root congestion increases, top mass and and rate of extension decreases. This holds true even if trees are potted up after the tipping point of root congestion. Bonsai trees are not in any way trained "against their natural behavior", unless you include pruning as unnatural. Bonsai takes advantage of largely unrecognized ways of working WITH a tree's natural inclinations in order to produce a desired effect. Proficient bonsai practitioners have an intimate understanding of How to care for trees and keep them healthy, even in the face of a considerable increase in the amount of stress the same species might be subjected to if it was grown under conventional container culture. You can't claim foul re bonsai techniques being applied to conventional container culture in order to keep trees at the peak of vitality, just because you might not understand how to apply those techniques. I generally find that whenever someone uses that argument, they don't really have an argument. When we pick tomatoes, it's best to remove the stems so they don't poke holes in the skin of adjacent fruits in the basket. Does that mean the practice of removing stems should not be practiced during the harvest of other fruits or vegetables? Finally, the same leaf (size) reduction and ramification strategies that are employed by bonsai practitioners aren't widely used on houseplants like F elastica for the simple reason that few have taken the time to widely share the techniques with houseplant hobby growers. The same increases in ramification and decreases in leaf size can be absolutely guaranteed if only the tree is appropriately pruned and pinched. I regularly discuss on various forums how to pinch to achieve these ends. Too, bonsai practitioners are very careful to ensure their plants do not become root bound to the point it hampers the plant's vitality. While reduced leaf size is indeed a symptom of tight roots, tight roots also decrease ramification and limit the number of leaves the plant can/will retain, so it's largely a self-defeating strategy. There are many strategies that we use to reduce leaf size, but intentionally allowing plants to become root bound is very low on the list and generally used only on older trees (mainly conifers) that are already finely ramified and in which limited growth is at least temporarily desirable. I'm not sure why you're bent on arguing about techniques and the results thereof that have been practiced for many centuries with predictable and explainable results. Al