Sorry for not coming back to this earlier. Hope the hound returned in good order and looking unrepentant. :-) Yes, pooch returned and was just fine. I had been getting up several times a night looking for her to maybe be laying on the porch (of course I left the light on all night) and magically she just reappeared one night at 3 AM. She looked well fed, was not hungry, and was clean, almost like she had been either someone's house dog, or that she had been tied somewhere. I just cannot imagine where she was as I drove each day looking for her and talked to probably 100 or more households, handing my tel # out, in case she was spotted. I've wondered if maybe she was dognapped and was being held in the hope that a reward would be offered for her. She has always been a pretty good escape artist, so she may have escaped and then somehow found her way home. Serious question: How do you keep your ribbons and rosettes and pictures? Serious answer: At the Indy show, actual ribbons or rosettes are not given except for certain 'classes' that are exhibited... Example:the winning display of 5 different US bred daffs is awarded the ADS(American Daffodil Society) Red-White-Blue Ribbon a winning display of 5 different reverse bicolors-ADS Maroon Ribbon A winning display of 12 cultivars and/or species from not less than 4 divisions-ADS Marie Bozievich (Green) Ribbon The biggie award, I think, is The Quinn Award which is a silver Medal for a collection of 24 different cultivars (!!!) and/or species from at least 5 divisions. There are numerous other ADS awards as well as Indiana Daffodil Society awards and Regional awards. Seasoned growers and showers win the Award classes as it takes numerous different cultivars, or numerous blooms of several different cultivars to put together a collection for the Award (bigger) winning classes. There are various awards for various 'collections' of Standards, Intermediates, Minis, and Historics. Everything I exhibited was either in single stem or a vase of 3 stem classes. Anyway...some of my First Place winners were Tripartite, a real prolific favorite of mine. Fragrant Rose...another favorite as it smells just like a rose. Triple Crown Mint Julep Hawera...Mini single stem AND mini vase of 3 blooms Bright Angel So much of my daff collection was acquired in 2008 and 2009, so it will be a while until all of those grow into 'clumps' giving me more 'choice' blooms to choose from come show time. When purchasing bulbs, I've started to try getting a wide variety of them from the different daff divisions as well as getting them with a nice mix of different bloom times, ie from very early to very late. I've got them listed on a spread sheet with that info, so I can 'sort' them and see just what I'm needing more of. (Maybe a little OCD?) I had intended to 'try' and get a bloom count of everything this year, to see how they are multiplying and to see which ones I might want to dig and divide to either share, or trade, or must divide and plant in 2 separate areas, thus maybe expanding the bloom time of a single cultivar. I never did get any photos of NOT Lemon Beauty to send to B&B. I will use yours if that is okay. Kathy, that would be fine. For anyone who may be curious, Kathy and I are trying to get a name on this daff which I'm thinking was sold as Lemon Beauty, which it clearly isn't. Here is the real Lemon Beauty. Olathe is a beauty! You imagine correctly, I need it bad. Consider it 'yours' if I get it dug, which I really hope/plan to do. Because of your reminder this is the first time I've visited our local Red Butte Gardens while the daffodils were blooming. Oh Sandy, I'm so glad you were encouraged to go and got some great pics to share. They are stunning and I imagine the hyacinths smelled heavenly. Wow! Scenes like this make me want to squeeze a lot more bulbs into my yard. Oh yes, there is always room for a few more. If you purchase any new ones this fall, and happen to have extras to trade, I'd love to work a trade with you for some new (to me) cultivars in smaller quantities. If I get them dug, I should have Olathe (link to pic in a post above) Triparte-pictured above) and Orange Phoenix pictured below and Geranium pictured below as well as others. For that matter, I would welcome trades with anyone who might have extras of newly purchased named daff bulbs, or named bulbs they have dug this year, that I don't have. Just remember to wait 6-8 weeks (8 is best) after bloom time to dig, cure and store until fall planting or trading time. Well, enough about daffs this AM...so much to do. Time allowing I hope to get a few pics of new (to me) blooms before they fade. I've been busy digging out wild onions and garlic from a woods area where I plan to plant new daffs this fall. I don't want other bulb foliage coming up among the daffs. I also need to move a few nice natives out of the area, and then the area can be sprayed in preparation for fall bulb planting. I wanna be done planting before linnea56 this fall. Sue

Vabyvlue, I had thought someone would have asked for more details before now, but maybe everybody thought I made it all up! I live in Terre Haute, so, a little bit more south than you are, but we did hit 15 below twice this winter. Marechal Niel is in a pot in a small greenhouse that stays at 50 degrees. However, I've had my greenhouse for 8 years and I've had the plant for 20 years. It's an own-root plant from Sequoia Nursery, from Ralph Moore's supplemental list that used to have so many neat varieties on it. The plant was always small and twiggy. I never pruned it, just moved it to a larger pot as needed. MN produced its flowers on 1" twigs, but I didn't care. The fragrance from one bloom was amazing and I could detect it from many yards away ( in a still corner of the yard). In the winter, I buried it a foot deep and dug it up in the spring. I kept it that way for a number of years and it stayed about a foot high, maximum. I think the key was minimal fertilizer in the fall so the wood could harden. I only ever cut off dead wood. Once we moved and I got my greenhouse, I sat MN on the floor in the corner and it rooted in the ground through the holes in the pot. It's still that way. It is never sprayed and probably gets up to 100 degrees on many days in the summer. I pour some Miracle Gro on it once in a while and it's still doing well so far. Blooms a lot in spring and some during summer. BTW - I did grow Rosette Delizy and Lady Hillingdon in the ground, also. Both were HEAVILY mulched each fall and then still dead to the ground every spring, but they did each give me some bloom by the end of the season. I was thrilled with even one bloom since I had never seen either in person. Hope that answers your question. I got your question via email, also, but couldn't reply since you have your email disabled. If you want more info via email, you'll need to change your profile. I'm happy to communicate here, but we may be boring the warm-climate growers! Bob

I had one case of RRD about Sept 2009, on a very tall mini (5 ft tall, so big for a mini). The bush looked odd in June, so I cut the odd cane off at the ground. However, the new growth looked weird and I dug the entire bush out in early Sept, plus three nearby rosebushes (2 HT and 1 miniflora). I dug deep and got their roots also. I wrote a letter and sent the key diseased canes to Dr. Jim Amrine at West Va. Univ. (by Fed Ex). Dr. Amrine confirmed it was RRD. He said it probably blew in from a highway that is about 3 miles from my house, that has woods growing around on either side. To Henry, I am not sure how he checked for RRD - sometimes by looking thru a microscope and seeing a dead mite; otherwise that he is knowledgeable of the symptoms - feathery, light green leaves, many needle-like thorns, thick stems, reddish growth and performed a visual inspection; or perhaps by another method. Fortunately, I have not had RRD since then. I planted petunias and garlic chives in the rosebed. (Farmers alternate crops.) This fall (2 years later), I transplanted micromini roses from a garden that was getting waterlogged just this year. So the micromini roses may make it or not. But they are 6 inches tall, so far. They do not have RRD, at least. They have 18" wire fences around them to protect them from rabbits and a raccoon. Also, to apply Round-Up so it does not affect neighboring plants, cut or saw a branch of the plant to be removed and paint concentrated Round-Up on the open cut with a paintbrush. For a big bush to be removed, make 2 or 3 cuts and paint those. Lastly, the MD Ag Extension Service does not care. I tried to report the RRD, but no one would take my report. Dr. Amrine made a note with his records.

Thought I'd post an update, since I got such helpful advice for my trees this past winter. All survived the winter indoors, even though, thanks to a lot of travel, I managed to dry them out pretty badly a couple of times, enough that the Trovita and the Bearss lost some leaves. Still, the Bearss actually bloomed and even set fruit. The Meyer bloomed off and on all winter, but never sent out any leaves and, when I set the four trees out about a month ago, still had not sent out a single leaf, since I received it. It had lost a couple of original leaves, but pretty much looked like it did when I received it last summer. Left two weeks ago for a long business trip and, while away the temps topped out in the mid-90's, unusual for New Hampshire, with heavy rains on a couple of days - basically hot and humid weather. Came back on Friday to find that all four trees are covered in new growth, YES, EVEN THE MEYER! There looks to be new growth from pretty much every leaf junction on the tree. And, it is blooming, again. The largest fruit on the Bearss is about an inch and a half long, so I'm hoping to have my first harvest this fall or winter. Maybe, I'll even have some other fruit, too? All-in-all, the trees look great, and I have to admit that they have not been babied in any way. My next two decisions are 1) should I prune to shape them (rather leggy), and 2) should I repot into larger pots? For #1 I am undecided. For #2 I am thinking maybe mid-July, once they flush out the new growth. I think I will check if they are root-bound and use that as my guide. We are headed into several days of rain. When we get a break I will fertilize them. So, in conclusion, for those who have cranky or 'balky' Dwarf Meyer Lemon trees in pots - don't despair. It took a year, but mine finally has sprung to life. Just give it lots of sun, water as needed and let the tree move at it's own pace. And, thanks to everyone on this forum, who gave me advice and support. I probably would have killed my trees without your help. If anyone is interested, I can take some digital pics and post them. narcnh