Fullerton JC has a greenhouse. The Fullerton Arboretum has a greenhouse too but they charge to take photos if you are a pro. I think UC Irvine might have one too.

Hiya, its kismet! I'm an active MG from Nassau County! The classes meet from Sept-Dec. every other year. The 2005 class is already filled with about 50 interested people from the county. The next set of classes is in 2007 in the fall. Contact the main office at 228-0426 Ext. 10 and ask to be placed on the Master Gardener contact list for 2007. You will need to submit once contacted an application form and a letter of intent addressed to our Extension Agent. The cost for the classes is $150.00 (don't quote me on this price). For that amount of money you get a binder with every fact sheet the county has, a binder from Cornell with the supplemental reading from their MG program, a bag to hold these 2 binders and a Felco #2 shears. The classes are from M-Th and meet at the Hicks Nursery Lecture Cemter on M and W. Tu and Th are usually class trips to discuss the topic of the week.Classes are usually given by Professors from Cornell, experienced MG's on their forte and some Professors from SUNY Farmingdale. Sometimes several topics are done per week. Homework is given, usually reviewing the fact sheets (I think I read through the majority of them by the time the classes ended) and a supplemental reading in the NYS Master Gardener binder. Quizzes are given weekly on the previous topic and at the end of the classes a final is given in essay form about your general knowlege about a dozen topics to choose from. Instructional hours are 150 and payback hours are 150 hours over a 2 year time period and 25 of those hours are mandatory on the Homeowner Hotline phones. Please contact me if any further questions! My name is Chris and everyone knows me over at the Greenhouse in East Meadow where the office is located.

I'm in Greene County, not really that far. My deck is adjacent to a busy road. I'm surprised that I haven't been mistaken for a recycling center with all the jugs and bottles. I'm surprised no one has mentioned Mary's Plant Farm. A friend that used to live in Oxford took me there last summer for a hypertufa class. I didn't drive so I can't give directions but they have a website. They grow most of their own plants. Mary and her daughter run it and they are amazing. They even have a little tea room with home baked goodies. Plants and dessert, what more can you ask. They give different classes and are such nice, down to "earth" people. You can actually see the plants growing and you know what you buy is hardy to this area. It's worth the trip. Check it out. Anyone here from Greene County? I'm just outside Xenia. Everyone, enjoy this weather. Ellen

I don't know that we have ever used Adams windows, but Allied and Spencer windows are good quality products. The upscale choice is clearly Spencer, but at $200+ per window, these can get rather pricey. A good quality aluminum combination storm/screen window will do the job for you. The trick is the "good quality" part. In or near your town is a storm window manufacturer. Look in the Yellow Pages or the Web for storm windows. In almost every case the local guy makes a very good quality combination storm window for not much money -- figure less than $80.00 per window -- and you can pick them up, avoiding delivery and shipping charges. He cn't compete with the box box stores on price, so he competes on quality, and usually wins. He will also have a showroom of some kind to display his windows. There you can look at them. Never buy any window sight unseen. If they seem flimsy, they are. Look for heavy gauge aluminum and ease of operation. If they are hard to operate in the store, they will be harder to operate in your house. There's a lot of debate over whether mechanically joined or welded windows are better. We have never seen much difference -- but we did see a window last year that seems to have been glued together with some kind of epoxy -- not a good window. They fell apart when we took them down. We buy our windows painted white, or, if we can get them, just primed (most fabricators will do that for you). Priming aluminum is something best left to the factory. Once we get them to the house, we take them apart and paint the frames (but not the sashes) with a spray paint that exactly matches the house trim. The paint is easy to come by. Take a piece of painted trim to Sherwin-Williams (the commercial store that caters to pro painters -- not the neighborhood S-W store) and ask them to match and mix up the color in spray cans with a formulation for metal. Figure one can for every 5 windows. For most houses 5 cans is enough -- and in most stores this is also the minimum order. Lightly sand the frames with a wet sanding sponge -- you can get these at the paint store. You want to rough up the factory paint a little so the new paint will adhere well. Wipe clean, then wipe again with alcohol. Spray two coats on the frames, let dry between coats and then for 24 hours. Reassemble the sashes and frames (you did remember to mark the sashes so you know which sash goes in which frame, yes? Use masking tape and a Sharpie.) Now the windows do not have the aluminum look, and in fact virtually disappear against the house trim. Install the windows in accordance with the manufacturer's instruction or, do it our way: First, dry fit each window before you start to install it to make sure it fits. Clean the frame and window trim with alcohol to remove all grease, dirt, etc. Let dry 15 seconds. Apply a generous bead of pure silicon caulk to the frame. Silicon remains flexible for centuries, yet, if you need to remove the window, you can break the silicon seal with a putty knife. DO NOT seal the weep holes at the bottom of the window. These allow any water or condensation trapped behind the storm window to get out rather than sitting there and rotting your sill. By the way -- the weep holes are DOWN. I can't tell you how many storm windows we have seen installed upside down. When handling the window, always keep the down side down. This reduces the risk you will install it upside down. Even pros do this on occasion. Certainly we have. Press the window firmly into place. You want to ensure that the silicon has good contact with the window trim all around the perimeter. Now screw down the window alternating from right to left, top to bottom, until all the screws are installed. Do not omit screws. The window has all those screw holes for a reason. Alternating, just like you tighten the lug nuts on a car wheel, keeps you from bending the window by tightening all the screws on one side before you put the screws in the other. When you are done, go inside and test the window. If it binds, then most likely it is twisted. Loosen screws just a little bit at a time until it operates smoothly. Now, still from the inside, put another tidy bead of silicon where the storm joins the window trim. Once this is done, there is very little risk of air infiltration around the edges of the window. Figure one weekend to paint, the next weekend to install. It's not hard -- in fact, it's only a five or six beer job. Good luck.