I am so glad I found this thread. I have planned my entire garden around non-toxic plants, not for dogs, but my horses and the barn kitties. Living on a farm, we also have a lot of kids visiting and the occasional dog :) With the price of vet bills (and house calls for horses) I believe you can't be too careful! I don't plant sweet peas, but found some great edible climbing peas with lavender and rose flowers...like mini sweet peas. Roses are my favorite (as long as I can hide them from the deer) along with several herbs, veggies and edible flowers. I've wanted to grow morning glories, but saw they were on the toxic list for dogs and cats. This summer I'm going to try them in pots with white petunias around them. I'm hoping they'll grow faster in the potting soil (we have short summers) and the cats don't like the petunias. They stayed away from my star jasmine (also a safe plant) last year in pots with the petunias. That was my favorite combination last year and I want to add a few more this summer :)

I live for this--seeing more people discover gesneriads! Its almost like a "cause". Why? well, because they are such neat plants and because so few people grow them compared to the variety of gesneriads out there needing to be grown. Aeschynanthus are great plants and it sounds like your basic instincts are not too far off the mark. Epiphytes of the gesneriad family all grow in the same type of mixes. Depending on your watering style and other conditions they like anywhere from a "light mix" to a barky epiphyte mix. The first, would be like my standard mix for all gesneriads--three parts Canadian peat moss, two parts perlite and one to one and a half parts vermiculite. I am always changing these ratios and many use a 1-1-1 mix of these ingredients. But, you can also use a mix like this, with up to about 50% of a good potting mix. My friend Alan, who religiously believes in simplicity, uses straight Supersoil, and does pretty well. Aeschynanthus don't like to dry out excessively but will do well with light drying out between waterings. They generally like to be kept lightly moist and lightly fed all the time when in growth (warm season) with a little more dryness in their drought season (winter). So, I, who underwaters, use larger pots and still I sometimes dry them out too much. I use a lot of deep 6" plastic pots or regular "azalea" pots. Smaller plants go in 4 to 5 1/2 inch pots. Aeschynanthus come from Asia, whereas xmas cacti come from the mountains of coastal Brazil. So, aeschynanthus have widely varying needs for minimum temperatures. The most popular of the commercial varieties are somewhat more tender, coming from Bali. These would be lobbianus, pulcher, 'Pullobia', radicans. But, other species come from cooler mountain areas and grow very well all year outdoors. The most hardy are garrettii, gracilis, parasiticus, x 'splendidus', with all the other species and hybrids inbetween. Up here in cooler SF bay area, I grow mostly indoors but have the hardy ones outside, where they tolerate dips to slightly below 32. Garrettii can take even our big freezes. I really like nematanthus (the "goldfish plant") which comes in many varieties. They are native to mountains of coastal Brazil, and really do well for me as outdoor plants. And, they are not as water-needy as fuchsias, by a long shot. They have beautiful glossy small leaves and wonderful flowers shaped like little fishes. Nematanthus are epiphytes too, so do not generally do well planted out in the garden but make wonderful outdoor hanging basket and potted plants for bright shade. A few columneas are also hardy enough for all year growing outdoors (erythrophaea, schiediana, and 'Sundowner'). I am being a bit conservative in these recommendations. I have known people even in my area who grew many other examples of these genera outdoors all year long, with great results. You can also grow streptocarpus, chirita, petrocosmea, sinningia and quite a few other gesneriads outdoors. Its a big family. for sources, check out the "Suppliers" page on the AGGS web site. You will find links there to Lyndon Lyon, Lauray of Salisbury, Kartuz, and other specialists in gesneriads. Kartuz in located in Vista, so could be a nice excursion for you (call in advance). Also, check out the Gesneriad Reference Web for over 1500 photos of gesneriads. I will post the link below. Jon Dixon Here is a link that might be useful: Gesneriad Reference Web

This plant belongs to Capsicum family.In fact I harvested plenty of peppers from the same plant during last summer.As I have mentioned earlier that this plant was transplanted from back yard garden at the end of summer of 2007 before the on set of freezing temperature to raise as pereniel plant.Plant is in sun room and about 9 months old producing bunch of flowers.I intend to take the plant out door by end of May 2008 by that time plant will be one year old.Since there are plenty of flowers and I am not sure the flowers will produce any fruits at this time I thought to use the flowers in salad.Few of the flowers have already droped.

So sorry to hear about your friend's dog getting sick, but glad he's okay. That's quite a hefty vet bill. As our expert Tally said above usually oleanders are so bitter that it's not nibbled by dogs, but there's always an exception. Thank you for the warning and letting us know that it can happen. Sago palms are another story. It's not at all unusual to hear about dogs chewing on the seeds and dying. When he was a young pup I saw Alfie starting to chew on the new sprouts around the bottom of my 30 year old mature Sagos. I prompty cut the sprouts back and surrounded the trees with heavy black plastic and then covered the plastic with a VERY thick layer of mulch. It's been almost three years. No more sprouts and the dogs and trees are fine. It all these years my female tree has only flowered three or four times. I carefully remove the seeds before they fall.