Check out my list and see if there's anything you'd be interested in. :) I'd love to try this in one of my clay slab areas.

Our conditions in MI were prolly the same as yours, JaG. I had great container plantings right up 'til frost when the material was not too temperature sensitive, but noticed the same thing with my tomatoes & peppers - lots of late fruit that never ripened. I also use a lot of tropical perennials in the floral display containers, and they took a long time to take off this year. We had regular frosts 2 weeks beyond our last frost date, and (garden) soil temperatures remained well below 55* until after the first week of June. Sorry for the cross-talk, HBG. I hope I'm close enough to being on-topic. ;o) I had thought about the possibility of an N deficiency - especially if you were using fresh bark/small pieces, but that wouldn't explain why one plant did well & another didn't. Still, I would put genetics well down on the list of probable causes. Remember this for next year: "By habit now, I literally rip the bottom half of the roots off every plant I use in containers. I then remove a healthy additional portion of the soil they come in before transplanting or potting." For plantings with many different plants (mixed containers) I save the old soil and roots in a pile, and after the plants are situated as I like them in the container, I use it to pack around the remaining roots to secure the newly planted plants. It's usually a much more water retentive soil than what's below it and works well to help keep good amounts of moisture near the roots until the plants are established. It's an example of how being familiar with the rules of how water behaves in containers can allow you to break the rule (of not using dissimilar soils in the same container) and make it work to your advantage. ;o) It may make you shudder to think of it, but I nearly always remove all blooms & buds from the plants I am newly planting. It hastens establishment & allows the plant to build a strong root system quickly, which ends up paying dividends over the long haul. You may have to go bloomless for an extra week or so, but I've always found it to be well worth it in the end. Good luck!! Al

Hi there. I know what you mean. I don't honestly remember going through this last fall, though our two buffies were much younger. THIS fall however, one of our gals started to look just ratty. She first lost all of her feathers around her neck. They share the pen with 4 indian runners so I began looking very suspiciously at one of our drakes. Then she lost her tail feathers, and her rump looked just plain round. THEN she lost all of her feathers around her vent area. I was starting to get concerned, except I could see the bristles around her neck where her feathers were coming in. Buffy didn't act herself either, she seemed reluctant to start the day and wouldn't come when I called. I started to worry a little, but she didn't quit eating, so I just kept on eye on her. Poor girl. Her sister didn't seem to suffer this year at all. It looks like it feels awful itchy, like coming home from a fresh haircut every hour, every day. Best I could do was make sure she had plenty of dirt to roll in - but it's hard for us to keep anything dry much for very long in these parts, so she just had to hang in there. Ours is better now, but I had to get after the rest of the flock for making fun of her. To make her feel better, I explained that one of my co-workers commissioned me to make a set of wings for their halloween costume this year, so her feathers won't be wasted in vain. The set of wings I'm making, I told her - would be "golden tipped" thanks to her troubles. She was rather non-plussed, but oh well. LF

Yeah, this neighborhood is, shall I say, special. Every street has a different tree type. Next street over is a Live Oak, street after that is some sort of cypress...And sadly we do have in our HOA clause to have two trees between the side walk and street and you have to have one tree between the sidewalk and the front of the house. It's another story if you have a corner house...I'm just worried when I buy a new one next week, it will die too now. Not to mention it will be a different size than the one next to it. I'm sure the HOA will complain about that too. Clay soil around here, high winds and the fact that it will be 101 today doesn't help but it is my understanding that they like this kind of weather. They throw houses up so quickly around here and it has been said that the trees are planted too deep. RIP my Chinese Pistache!