Thanks for all your information. I have a little difficulty 'thinking' in degrees F, but I think you are all in a little warmer zone than I am. I just chose an arbitrary date of April 1 for the experiment and that day it was sunny, minus 2 degress (below freezing), and was going to a high of zero degrees (freezing for us). I still had over 2 feet of snow in the yard. Those temperatures are considerably lower than ML and Vera. ML's planting time of 2/8 is unthinkable in Ottawa - we are still in a deep freeze, and we don't usually reach temps. of 70 until well into May. My WS sowings on 3/27, near to Vera's dates, are not sprouting to date, in spite of about 10 days of unseasonably warm weather (up to 75 one day). Yet those sown five days later in the cooler are now sprouting. Tracy's sowings on March 31, just before mine, are already 2 inches high with a couple of weeks head start on mine. If I use their temperatures as a guideline, I would have to sow well into late April or early May, in which case I'd end up with lots of green tomatoes like last year. I believe the cooler is acting like a cold-frame, and now it's working, I think it's my best bet for growing toms. outdoors before my last frost date of May 6. If my seedlings ( I had two more today) survive the cold snap approaching (hovering around freezing and below freezing temps. and snow on Tuesday) I will have to do some more research on temperatures, to see if it is reasonable to repeat, or even start a little earlier. In fact, I think I will do that anyway. Getting a head start, being able to avoid white-fly, and not having to harden-off are all worth it. I haven't heard from my 'partner in crime' yet. It will be interesting to compare notes. Northerner.

I understand what you are saying John. I have been in the nursery business for over 50 years now and I know how things have changed over those decades. Sadly I also know how very outdated much of that info one can read online is. Add to that the need they feel they have to try to cover all points within a brief page length (so some will read it) and one finds all sorts of issues hidden between the lines. In the article you linked for example they skim lightly over the issues of "free of pathogens and seed-free", of "density and disease concerns", "hold nutrients well", etc. assuming the reader will know how to prevent all those issues - issues that kill more container plants than all other issues combined and so easily avoided by simply using a bagged already sterile mix. They make no mention of the size of containers and even imply these "mixes" will work in any container. They don't discuss how one is supposed to evaluate "density" or recognize what is good or bad density. They don't address HOW one is supposed to retain nutrients when daily watering is often needed. I could go on but but as I mentioned above all this is discussed and debated in infinite detail on the Container Gardening forum as it is only indirectly related to Growing Tomatoes. Bottom line - the choice of what to use is yours. I have tried them all over many years and IMO container mixes that incorporate coarse sand (except for succulents), top soil in any of its various forms, much less garden soil and even compost pose far more problems for plants grown in containers than any potential benefits they might have. Dave

cynic, We have factory installed built-in GPS in both of our cars. Both units allow the user to choose the type of route they desire. Ours allow for 'Maximize Freeway'; 'Minimize Freeway'; 'Direct Route'; or 'Easy Route'. The four different routes will all take you to the same place. Since you mention "exit", is it possible your friend had a route programed that did not maximize freeways? Mary, We love our GPS units & would never voluntarily purchase another vehicle without them. We've been using marine GPS since the government released it (2001, I think?) with WAAS. IMO, there's no better company than Garmin for GPS. We've got their marine flagship model on our boat & it's wonderful. It's got radar, GPS, weather imaging, 3-D, sonar, & ties into our auto-pilot & VHF radio. We still chart our course the old-fashioned way as a precaution but truthfully it's more just an exercise to keep our navagation skills sharp. The GPS pilots our boat much more accurately than we could ever accomplish with charts. Garmin, IMO, makes the best GPS navigational equipment available & they've been at it for a long time. Best Buy is having a sale on Garmin today. The sale was just for yesterday (Friday) & today (Saturday). /tricia

Hi all, It's been awhile since we've done our last update on our herb garden. We went away on vacation for a few days and came back to some sad looking plants. We made sure the jars were full before we left, but unfortunately our plants were too thirsty. The basil and mint plant jars were bone dry and the plants were drooping like crazy. This is a picture from our cat sitter from halfway through the vacation. She was a bit worried! Luckly for us, when we got back all we had to do was refill the jars and a day or two later we had some happy and healthy plants. We've already had a couple meals with the basil and the parsley. I'm in the process of looking up some great Mojito recipes for the wife and me. Looking forward to those! Here are a couple pictures of the happy plants that I just took this morning. They love this light! Crazy roots!