Nice looking tree. I wish mine were that mature. Many or perhaps most feijoa (pineapple guava) are not self fertile. That means they require a second feijoa to serve as a pollenizer. You didn't mention whether your second feijoa bloomed this year. It will only help in pollination if it blooms and its pollen is viable at the same time that the flowers on your existing feijoa are maturing. In other words, there needs to be significant overlap in bloom time. Changing the amount of water won't help the fruit set if the flowers are being pollinated with compatible pollen. I'm sure you know that pineapple guavas aren't actually guavas or pineapples similar to how a custard apple isn't an apple nor a custard. OK, well feijoas and guavas are more closely related, but you get the idea.

I keep recommending that Jerry talk to a good construction lawyer because, in Texas, getting residential construction problems fixed is made horribly complicated by the Texas Residential Construction Commission and various statutes that ultimately PROTECT BAD BUILDERS. Further, Jerry's situation is complicated by the fact that he purchased what he called in another thread "an 80% complete repossessed home". That means there was another builder on the scene before Jerry ever hired his current GC. The other builder may have gone out of business or the original owner may have quit paying him because of constuction issues we haven't even heard about. The 80% completed house may have sat vacant and exposed to the weather for weeks or even months before it was repossessed and sold to Jerry. Even if originally properly built, if the house sat semi-exposed to the weather, that could result in numerous problems down the road One house in the neighborhood where I am building sat at the Tyvek-wrap stage for over two years after the original owner and his builder got into an irreconcilable dispute. Neighbors began referring to it as the Tyvek house. After about a year, it was repossed by the bank and the ONLY reason I know it isn't Jerry's house is that after tying unsuccessfully to unload it at auction, the bank finally had the house finished about a year ago so that it could be sold. No one would touch it in its incomplete state and at one point I know the bank had dropped the price to little more than what the land alone was valued at. Still no takers. My point though is that if/when legal wrangling starts, Jerry's current GC can and probably will point the finger at the previous builder who is likely to be judgement proof at this point. And, even if he is not, he will point the finger back at Jerry's current builder and/or claim that any defects are due to the house having sat incomplete for whatever period of time. Jerry will be caught in the middle. Plus it seems like Jerry just keeps finding additional problems with the house and that his GC, instead of really working to make things right, simply keeps demanding that he (and his subs) be paid. So far we've heard about: 1) Leaking windows... which Jerry seemed rather unconcerned about until folks on this board pointed out that windows should NOT leak at all. Haven't heard whether the leaking windows have/have not been fixed yet. I suspect they were improperly flashed and will have to be removed and reinstalled. I also bet that once Jerry starts trying to get the windows taken care of, the installers will insist that the windows were improperly manufactured and the manufacturer will insist that installation was faulty. In the meantime water is very likely penetrating the wall cavity under the windows which will eventually lead to mold and rot. 2) At least one crack in the foundation that is wide enough that Jerry's CG was able to spray water into it... maybe it is nothing but I'd be getting a foundation engineer out to take a look at it NOW just to be sure! 3) SOLID hardwood floors that are bucking. Apparently they were glued to a slab foundation with NO moisture barrier and before being given any time whatsoever to acclimate to the climate of the house plus they were installed with inadequate expansion rooom. Never-the-less the installers claimed the flooring materials were faulty. Frankly, it rather concerns me that Jerry is naive enough to have been surprised when the floor installers claimed the flooring materials were faulty because pointing the finger at someone else is a time-honored mechanism that miscreants use to escape responsibility! I would lay money right now the manufacturer will say that the installation was faulty and therefore that the warranty has been waived. Jerry says the installer has ordered more wood flooring. What I don't hear him saying is that the installer has agreed to PAY for the new wood. Why would the installer pay to buy new wood if the original materials were actually defective???? But the manufacture is NOT going to supply another load for free if it believes that the problems were caused by faulty installataion. And, if the installers don't pay for the new wood, Jerry will have no choice but to pay for it because the supplier can and will put a lien on Jerry's property if it isn't paid. 4) Inadequate amounts of insulation AND then insulation guy lying thru his teeth! Further, either the GC is activly complicit in the insulation sub's attempt at fraud or at least he did nothing whatsoever to check that his sub had actually done the work he was hired to do. Let's face it, if Jerry can figure out that the sub merely bent over his measuring devices over rather than actually adding another 5" of insulation, shouldn't a half-way competant GC have been able to figure that out as well? None of these defects are minor cosmetic flaws. Every single one of them is a HUGE deal yet the GC just keeps saying "pay me, I'm done. Pay the sub, he's done." My guess is that there are other flaws as well in this house that will manifest themselves over time. The GC is hoping to get his money and disappear before Jerry finds anything else. One thing a good construction lawyer would probably recommend is a series of inspections by experts that he knows to be competant in order to try and figure out just what all else is wrong with the house. Wiring? Plumbing? Roof? Who knows? I could be wrong but knowing that the GC overlooked the fact that the insulation guy folded his measuring device over by 5" so that it would show 12" - 13" inches of installation when there was really only 7" - 8" strongly suggests to me that he cannot be trusted to have properly supervised any of the rest of his subs either. It is not totally clear to me whether Jerry has "closed on the house" since apparently he hasn't finished paying the GC. I would actually be surprised if Jerry's contract even ALLOWS him to retain any monies upon closing since the form contract promulgated by the Texas Association of Builders and used by probably 99% of builders in Texas specifically disallowers retainage. However apparently Jerry has taken possession of the house because he refers to the builder giving him back the keys. In general I believe that once an owner takes possesion of new construction in Texas, the clock starts ticking on the Owner's ability to bring a claim under Texas's statutory warranties for new home construction. A good construction lawyer would know whether the clock is already ticking for Jerry and would know the statute of limitations for each of the various construction defects that Jerry is dealing with. I don't but I do know that in some cases the statute of limitations is as short as ONE YEAR... and you have to have gone thru all of TRCC's required steps BEFORE that time period is up. You cannot just show up in court the day before the SOL runs and say, hey, I want to bring a suit for breach of warranty suit. (Prior to TRCC, you could do that but shortening the effective warranty period is just one more way the TRCC protects builders.) Based on what Jerry has written, I think his house is a disaster waiting to happen. There are complicated legal hoops that Jerry will need to jump through before he can possibly bring a legal claim. He needs to understand them now so that IF/WHEN he finally decides he needs to sue, he will be ready to do so. I am worried that without some legal advice, he will wait too long to begin the necessary hoop-jumping processes and the statute of limitations will run on his claims. I'm worried that if Jerry doesn't pay the subs because of their substandard work, they will simply file liens against his house that will then cloud his title and ultimately force him into court anyway. I'm worried that Jerry seems to be doing all his communicating with his GC and with subs orally rather than in writing. That means that if/when this all winds up in court - or more likely, before an arbitrator that is likely to be biased in the builder's favor to begin with - he will have no proof whatsoever to support his version of the story. Frankly, it feels like I'm watching a train wreck in slow motion. In advising Jerry to at least talk to a really good construction lawyer, I was not and am not trying to drum up business. I don't practice construction law and know that I don't understand it well enough to advise anyone. In fact, if I were in Jerry's shoes, I too would have to hire a lawyer and I would consider it money well spent. I just really truly hate to see a good man with a brand new baby watch his dreams turn into a protracted nightmare.

Thanks for the ideas! I think we are probably right that this is a physical process, and NOT a chemical one. Gee: just when I thought we stoners had only to focus on the myth that soapstone is porous and needs to be sealed...Now we have to go after that oxidation myth too. Er, well, at least we obsessed stoners do. Maybe that only means me! Where is Vicki... But I still can't quite get my brain around how this works. If I rub oil on other non porous surfaces (glass, ceramic, plastic) the color doesn't change at all. Wet ceramic doesn't look darker than dry ceramic. But if I rub oil or water on porous substances, then I see a color change. Yet soapstone is nonporous. So in what magical middle land does this stone reside where a purely topical application changes its color so dramatically? Maybe I should ask the Straight Dope guy. Supposedly there is no question he can't answer. I'll plan on doing that... Cleo: all that communing with my stone has done damage. I now have a severe case of tendonitis in my elbow!! I can't believe it. I am constantly reminded of that infamous Seinfeld episode, The Contest. Remember the hand model whose hands got stuck in a permanent claw shape from...er...overuse?? ;-) Francy

The openness of the immediate vicinity around your release point is always an important consideration, as well as whether there are nearby natural areas. I assumed you got Ladybird larvae, they won't disappear on you too quickly, but the adults are too mobile to put a lot of reliance on. As Rhizo mentions, if the adults move in on their own they'll hang around. But if dropped out of a container they're more likely to try and put distance between themselves and their confinement. And more so if the temperatures in your conservatory are above the normal for the environment they come from. It's a bit of a novel idea but you can use a vacuum cleaner to remove Whitefly. As long as you can adjust the suction power it can be done without damaging the plants. Put the dust bag in a plastic bag in the freezer before emptying it out. Well, vacuum cleaners aren't exactly natural, but same effect though.