Hi Sue, I went to your home page and saw your were from Canada. I wanted to e-mail you direct but I see you don't have your e-mail posted there. In any case I bought 3 vandas from Angel Street Orchids. Here is there home page: http://www.angelstreetorchids.com/ I bought Ascda. Blue Tahourdin 'Bronze Grape' which to my surprised arrived in spike. I also purchased Ascda. Motes Hot Chestnut 'Mary' HCC/AOS and a Vanda (Med Laughlin x Agatha Motes) 'Maui Spots' They were very cheap and of nice size and quality. I grow them in an attached green house. I grow mostly paphs. but have the vandas on the glass side where the door is. Picture a free standing green house without one of the small ends. That would be the side that attached to my house. It is not a lean two type. I heat it in the winter in the day to 68 and down to around 60 F at night. They are mostly bare root and get watered every day. I can tell you from experience the Ascda. Princess Mikasa's are great ones to grow. I have one pink one and a couple of the blue ones (one clone and one none clone). They bloom often for me. Especially once they get some size to them. My pink one and dark blue one are currently in bloom. I go to South Carolina in the spring and fall via car, so always try to check out Lowes for those bag vanda orchids. They are small but will grow in time. I even tried a couple of flasks of vandas about 6 years ago. Many died and I wonder if I'll live long enough to see any of them bloom. (I hope too :-) as I'm not ready to kick the bucket for many years. Click on Bob8 and it will bring you to my home page and then click send and e-mail. Then we can talk off of this site if you prefer. Always will to talk orchids and try to help. Bob in Albany, N.Y.

Hello fellow OC. My name is Kathy and I live in Harriman. I love to garden and recently moved to Orange from Rockland. In Rockland, I had beautiful gardens but had to leave all my plants when I moved. I live in an old, small house with a lovely yard and have begun anew. Because my gardens are new, I do not have anything to exchange except questions,ideas and what nurseries are really good and inexpensive in the area... I wanted to try loves-lies-bleeding this year, I am glad to hear they did well. I love perennials especially iris and day lillies. I began a small herb "patch", and have a nice vegetable garden. I have some magnificant trees in my yard (that is what sold me on my house) and am starting some shade gardens. As you can see, I have allot of work to do.

We have a large number of Phlox paniculata ("tall garden phlox"), planted and maintained (with periodic division and soil upgrading) close together. We have little or no powdery mildew which I put down to garden hygiene/more freedom from stressors, nor any other diseases/pests affecting our phlox. Normally we see very little yellowing of leaves, but this year there's been maybe half a dozen smaller phlox, all planted on or close to the edges of the flower beds, with extensive leaf yellowing. I've cut the affected parts back and if the plants don't bloom this year that's fine. The one very notable difference this spring (even into the summer), compared with previous years, has been an excessive amount of rain. Soil which is holding too much water interferes with/prevents the absorption of nutrients by the roots of plants. The result is plants that struggle to survive and may die. I'd be pretty sure this is what has produced our yellow leaf effect. The plants became weak/sick because the soil around them was waterlogged for too long a time so they were nutrients deprived.

Good point Luis, I just figured the upstate NY part would narrow it down. The experiment is more geared toward the winter and bloom hardy specimens, but I’m not ruling the others out. To satisfy your curiosity, some of my mop heads are still totally green and others are just about in full dormancy, and they’re all lined up next to each other. Same goes for just about everything else around the area. It’s been a warm fall, and for the most part the stuff that’s totally dormant is in the mountains or spots that pick up pockets of colder air. We’re forecast for upper 50’s to mid 60’s every day for the next week.