Flour is one of the greenest materials you can add. I suppose milk and meat would be greener. Greenness is based on protein content, not color. More protein = more green. Brownness is based on carbohydrate content, not color. The more complex the carbohydrates, the browner it is. Leaves are pretty complex, but some grass plants have a lot of protein in their leaves. That's why this isn't such an easy topic to simplify. Find a horse stable and talk them into taking some of their manure. Before you use any horse manure on your lawn, test it. You test it by soaking a handful in a gallon of water and pouring it onto a broadleafed weed or a test plant. Some horse feed materials have been sprayed with a weed killer that persists through the horse's digestive system and even persists through the composting process for a couple years. If the test plant dies overnight, then don't use the manure in your garden - ANYWHERE. It will move through the soil and eventually kill everything that isn't a grass or sedge.

" Sometimes, for what ever reason, a rose just isn't a good one." - This is SO TRUE! I got a dud Iceberg last year. It did bloom decently, despite being a breeding ground for black spot from the day it arrived to the day the first frost put it into dormancy. Its canes were thin and limpy and its leaves were scarce. I was sooo disappointed because I had heard nothing but great reviews from people all over the country. I contacted the nursery that sold me the rose (Heirloom roses) and the replacement they sent already looks so much better than the dud! Hopefully it won't breed black spot like the last one did. If it does then I'm not trying again. Try contacting the nursery you bought Midas Touch from and ask them if they'll replace it since it's "failed to thrive". One more thought: do you feed your roses? Maybe Midas Touch needs more nutrients than the other roses and doesn't compete well with them. How much space does it have? My Midas Touch is doing wonderfully and it's only a year old. It isn't very large yet, but it is about the size of my other one-year-old roses. It's own root also, if that makes a difference, with plenty of space to soak up nutrients.

Kordes rule in my z5/6 no spray Massachusetts garden. I have also had great luck with some of the Easy Elegance roses. "Yellow Submarine" has gorgeous yellow blooms all summer, even though she only gets about 4 hours of sun, "Music Box" which was a brand new band last year so not prolific at flowering yet but has blooms of pink and yellow swirls and "Centennial" which sadly seems to be out of production and my favorite has beautiful softest pink to cream tea rose like blooms. No scent though. Yellow Submarine courtesy of rose solutions Macy's Pride courtesy Easy Elegance website All of the Easy elegance roses are own root grown and nursery stock has a two year guarantee. I have "Macy's Pride" on order another creamy/soft yellow rose. The only thing their roses lack is scent. For DA I have good luck with Heritage, Charlotte and Windermare which is a blooming machine though not heavily scented. Bolero was decent as was Julia Child although Julia is not very hardy. The Kordes were exceptional though and most came through the winter with very few issues, a few broken canes from heavy snow and minimal tip death. As a plus some of them even smell delicious :-) Sharon

Thanks, Socks! Yeah, in SoCal and the Bay Area, the sun was just different even when hitting 100. I can’t explain it—ours is like....FIRE. Haha. I moved here from the East Bay where it’s not necessarily cold, but the succulents I brought roasted in a day or two like I put it in a broiler set to 550. This area is only morning sun to 12:30 with early morning filtered though the leaves of a tree (shown). I have other areas where I could move this bench (my BF made it for me!) — it was in a spot adjacent to said tree that got tons of sun over winter but now that the sun is higher, only gets hits for two hours of full sun. Or the south end of my yard — more light, but I can’t see the area from my patio. First world problems.,