My tomatoes always grow taller than any cage I've ever seen. I use 6 ft "t"-posts and twine instead. This year I swear I am gonna prune them because they always become this giant macrame knot of vine by July and I can't get to all the fruit without a machete. I only fertilize if I see yellowing leaves or some other weakness in the plants and that has rarely happened. At my old yard the tomatoes and peppers would be head high by this time of year and it was because they were stretching for the sun (that garden only got 6 hours of strong sunlight in mid June, so I wouldn't call it a full sun spot).

I wanted to say a great big Thank You to Stardust !!!! The swap was a success. She did a lot a work to pull this together. The hall was great and easy to find. There were tables and chairs inside for a great lunch of all the food everyone brought. Of course, all nicely decorated! It was fun to see all the door prizes that were all wrapped. And there was a very nice silent auction of books and home decorations. Then, on to the swap. Names were chosen at random to start the rounds and everyone redeemed the tickets they were given for the plants they brought in exchange the the plants they wanted. It took many rounds to use up the tickets. We sure had lots and lots of plants. Stardust brought about 60 plants. Wow! So, everyone got to select a "bonus" plant after they ran out of tickets. So, thank you so much. This was a lot of work and turned out to be a lot of fun. Also, thank you to Stardust's long time & very good neighbor friend who helped the whole day and made the refreshments. I can see that you did a lot of planning, too. Here are the lucky guys who came home with me::::

Wow, that's a lot of plants! I don't have a list of what I'm growing in my little gardens -- sometimes it takes me a couple of weeks in the spring to realize that that weird looking weed in the corner is something I've had for years. I just assume that more plants than not will grow in this area! One of the more unusual plants I grow is agapanthus. Not a particularly hardy variety, this was simply a florists' plant my mother gave me four years ago. But it's come up reliably every year for the past three seasons in Central Ohio. It's planted against a south-facing brick wall with excellent drainage, and apparently doesn't realize it's not in zone 8+ anymore! One of my mother's more spectacular plants is a 15 year old calamondin orange that arrived as a little "get-well" houseplant. It spends the winter on the unheated glassed in back porch in Cincinnati, and now stands over 6' tall in the pot, and is nearly 4' around. It always has flowers and fruit on it, and we've picked 200 ripe fruits at one time.

I've traded plumeria for cherry tomato seedlings, brugmansia for seeds, bromeliads for unrooted cuttings.. It just depends on what you want in return. I'm bringing stuff that is extra out of my garden. Stuff I've rooted cause I can't throw anything out, pot up every tiny seedling, root cuttings I find in alleys or trash piles, I can't see a plant abandoned! I drag them home & wonder why. If you showed up at my house I'd give you a shovel & help you dig pretty much anything that can be divided. Or take cuttings of it. I try & bring home less than I take & one of these days may come home with nothing. Other people only want to trade like for like, a big rooted plant for the same thing. This is a personal choice. But me, I LIKE to trade a big blooming plumeria for a tomato seedling-the newbie that I traded with was soooo happy, and now she is rooting cuttings of that same plumeria & sharing it with others. It just makes you feel good to see someone so happy that they got a plant they adore & it cost you a pittance if anything. Potting soil is still pretty afordable and you can get empty pots from everywhere-everyone I know saves them for me. Warm fuzzies are the best thing in life and nothing is warmer than a happier gardener. Relax and enjoy the swaps, don't get uptight and freak out, make trades that make you happy, think about your plants going to new homes & brightening lives. Tally HO! Oh, and come to the island. I have shovels, cutters, bug spray, empty pots, plastic bags, newspaper and a cool place to rest. No ice though, bring your own, I hate ice.