Anurag - the thread about container soils and water retention was written with the hope that those reading it would come away with an understanding of how water behaves in soils, & particularly how particle size and other physical characteristics impact perched water retention and o/a water retention. It's up to the grower to decide what he/she wants to do - how diligently they want to work at reducing the amount of excess water their soils hold. 1:1:1, screened bark:screened Turface:grit is the most productive soil I've used, but I don't use it for everything. Veggies & plants I know are only going to live a year of go 1 year between repots, usually go in the 5:1:1 mix. All of my woody plants, housep0lants including succulents, and other plants I know will be in the same soil for 2 growth cycles or longer, go in the gritty 1:1:1 mix. The 1:1:1 and 5:1:1 ratios are guidelines, but they're good ones. They minimize the amount of perched water a soil holds, and the gritty mix makes a good run at maximizing the volume of water held inside soil particles while still offering additional adjustability. If you live in a rainy climate and you're using the gritty mix, you might want to increase the amount of grit and decrease the amount of Turface commensurately. If it's dry where you live, increase the Turface and decrease the grit - but make sure that the soil holds enough water to carry you through the dry days, but not so much your plant suffers during periods of prolonged rain. Shading the pots when it's hot is very helpful. High soil/root temps is one of the primary limiting factors for container growers. I like soluble synthetic fertilizers. There is no more efficient way to ensure your plants get what they need, when they need it, at the right ratio, and in a favorable o/a concentration. How you fertilize is up to you, but soluble synthetics make fertilizing almost foolproof, as long as the grower holds up his/her end of the deal. When you root prune, the object is to eliminate large roots that aren't attached to the trunk and are in unfavorable positions to make room for and increase the number of fine roots, which do all the work except anchoring and transport. You'll need to develop a feel for root pruning because all plants don't get the same treatment. Reread the thread about water movement in soil, and the one about trees in containers. Make sure you understand what's in those threads. If you do gain that understanding, it should make a significant difference in what you get back for your efforts. Best luck. Al

Colin3...guess that there are always going to be fruit flies, but maybe the furniture units will have a discreet jar of cider vinegar/few drops of detergent to catch those annoying bugs? I still got a few even with freezing/microwaving my scraps...think that they came in on the bananas or cantaloupe that were on my counter. I can't keep my worms outside here as the temps reach 110 in the summer. reedandleaf...thanks for the compliment! Tax breaks for composting? Now that's a good idea though raising chickens in my small city yard probably isn't...lol The great thing about raising worms, is that just about everyone could do it and it really isn't that expensive to start if someone gives you the worms or you are willing to go digging in the compost/manure piles.

One thing I missed this morning on the other forum was the warranty.What exactly is warranted? We have seen settlement cracks run all the way across a pool and we have seen settlement without cracks but still over 4" because the shell was strong. The latter may not be covered. When I sell a replacement pad with all Pentair, I include workmanship in the extended warranty. I just saw the EZ Touch. If you add a Spa Command at the spa, you can control the temp, pump speed for stronger or slower jets, turn other things on like the waterfall, lighting... Brush once a day for at least an additional 2 weeks. The devil is in the details. Read the contract very carefully. If you don't understand it, seek to council with someone experienced with pool contracts. Everyone will want to play the CYA card. Is there a completion date promised? Allowances for weather? Scott

kvetchlambkin, thanks for the kind words. When I first started gardening a few years ago I knew pretty much nothing about it. Everything I read talked about the importance of compost, so I started researching how to make compost. If I remember correctly one of the better articles was "compost 101" just google and you will find a ton of info. I always preferred the "hot method". This method gives you usable compost in a fairly quick time frame. To start with you need a lot of leaves. In the fall when people start bagging up their leaves I would go around and collect them before the city picked them up. I met with people and asked permission and asked questions about what if any pesticides they used and stuff like that. Also no leaves from walnut trees. I would dump a bunch of them on the ground and mow them up with a push mower until they were chopped up pretty fine. Start with a layer of that, then add a layer of greens, like left over plants out of the garden, grass clippings and stuff like that, then a layer of chicken manure, throw in some wood ashes, etc etc. There is a lot of stuff that is good for composting and a lot of stuff that is not. I would build my piles in layers with chopped up stuff, adding in "hot stuff". After it sits a few days it heats up and gets pretty hot. After a week or so goes by it cools back down. After the pile cooled down, I took a pitch fork and put the top third in a separate pile, the middle third in another pile. Then make a new pile...what was the top becomes the middle, the middle becomes the bottom and what was the bottom is now the top of the new pile. It heats back up and cools back down. Repeat this a few times and you end up with some really good compost in a short amount of time. Chopping everything up makes things go a lot faster. It's really interesting and there are many other methods also. Just google it and you will get a ton of info. Make a bunch of piles and you will develop muscles in places you didn't know you had! lol Hope this helps. Angela