One comment on manure from farm animals. Recent research suggests that kids that grow up around farm animals are much less likely to develop allergies than other kids. The theory is that the constant exposure to relatively harmless bacteria causes the immune system to focus on infective substances rather than on harmless materials such as molds and pollens, etc. I know of no studies that show that exposure to animals and manures (certainly plenty fresh on the farm) causes an increase in the infection rate of children (or adults). If you have worked on a farm, you know that you don't wear gloves all the time to protect yourself from the bacteria. It is to protect the hands from injuries. Agreed that exposure to e coli and other organisms that one has not developed a resistance to or a tolerance of can produce significant disease in an individual whose immune system has not be "hyped" up by continuous exposure to bacteria and other organisms. It is also highly likely that that individual has allergy problems. In the military (the same things happens when one travels), people coming for training from other countries tend to pick up significant GI problems from exposure to the local e coli and other bacteria. If you go to their country for long, you will probably experience the same thing. Again, in general, to contact an infective agent, usually a certain "load" is required to cause infection unless a person is severely immunocompromised. An example is typhoid where a healthy individual will need to consume in excess of 4000 typhoid bacteria at one time to contact the disease. Washing lettuce will reduce but not remove all bacteria. But it is not usually necessary (or possible) to remove all the bacteria (unless you cook it to 160 degrees for 20 minutes or boil it, etc). Our bodies have over many thousands of years developed amazing ability to tolerate our environment. It is reasonable to disagree on this. I'll have to admit I have eaten all kinds of things out in the garden (usually wiping off the obvious dirt first), and have not noticed and ill effect. But then my body has undoubtedly has developed a level of immunity to the organism in my garden. A level of respect for the danger of eating possibly contaminate food materials is certainly warranted. For me, fish pond water would not concern if it had been applied early in the production of the crops. Just an opinion.

DRAGONFLY - As for watering, I water from the bottom until final plant out. Then, unless I have the plant in a SWC (I build my own), all watering is from the top. And you're right, I judge each plant individually as to its needs. I am fully retired now and have all the time I want to spend on my hobbies. I'm happy you found the spreadsheet useful. Don't forget to change any data values to reflect the world of growing tomatoes where YOU live. Also add any toms (or ??) to track your garden's results. NATURALSTUFF - My plants are normally still bearing fruit at first frost. If you give a plant all of its needs, it doesn't have to go "rootbound" in a container. Rootbound plants are telling you that they are not receiving all of their needs, and they're extending more roots to try and find what they need. Last year, the last plant to go was a Cherokee Purple that was in an 18 gallon plastic pot. The plant had four toms left and they eventually ripened on the kitchen counter. I only had 23 containers last year, but they produced more than 270 pounds of tomatoes. I think that's a pretty good yield. I had plenty of tomatoes here at the house and gave away enough to have my neighbors knocking on the door this spring saying I should not forget them this year. I control the heat of "Hot-lanta" by giving my plants some shade when the sun's intensity is its strongest. I also don't allow the sun to have much direct contact with the few black nursery pots that I'm currently using. Watering in the AM also helps offset the heating of the container. Each grower needs to deal with the environment they are given. I've grown both in the ground and in container over the last 55+ years and have decided now the potting mixes and fertilizer/soil amendments available are far better than growing in the ground. So, even if I could have my dream 5 acre tomato ranch, I would still grow in containers - lots of containers. I mean, just think of all the soil-borne diseases that you eliminate. Anyhow, I hope the season goes well for all. Take care Ted

hello well I'm fully into getting ready to move(funny we have not evan listed the house or looked at a new one yet) but I'm going throug 10 years of accumulated stuff and getting rid of much of it. my aim is to get most unnessasary stuff packed and put in storage before we evan list the house. I still need to do some painting and lots of rilly good cleaning. wow I would love to have a house with 3 acres, but we are looking to move to Missouri, about 20 to 30 miles from here, I would like to be much closer to my in-laws farm so I can do much of my gardening there(180 acres should be enough to keep me buisy for a few years) idealy I would like to build a house at the farm but it is over a mile to the nearest house, and I'm not sure I want to be so isolated. well I can't wait to see what I get..... stay warm everyone michelle

There are many rules of thumb for cfm, even linear dimensions of the hood edges excluding walls. One can also calculate on the basis of effluent velocity and hood aperture. (I've covered that somewhere.) But all of these will, as pointed out above, likely end up being well over 300 cfm for any hood that would work with a 48 inch cooktop. Most of us would agree that if financially feasible, a properly heated, pressurized, balanced MUA system is needed, and, (in my view) the affordability of a 48-inch Wolf range should include the MUA cost in the project. However, there may be ways of circumventing some of the costs. One way (won't work for fireplaces) is to have any other combustion appliances (furnaces and hot water heaters and gas dryers) in a room that is isolated from the kitchen (air flow wise) with its own not necessarily well heated minimal MUA (after all, the flow rate for these appliances will be small). Then the safety issue is accounted for, even if the inspector won't care. Then a passive MUA design (a damper in a duct) passing outside air to a heater would be sufficient to pull in sufficient replacement air. The kitchen pressure would be low (lower if filtering is used), the hood flow would not be what one might expect, but the code would be met and safety achieved. A 10-inch duct with pressure sensitive damper flowing air (due to negative house pressure) past a heater of some type (think 100 kBTU/hr order of magnitude) would be the type of heater required, maybe larger in MN. You would save the cost of the big blower needed for pressure balanced MUA, and the cost of a proper pressure control system and its tuning. kas