I think if people lower their expectations of a round robin and also agree to doctor up the box at each stop then you can have a really nice robin. I have gotten a couple of dog boxes in the past but for the most part have enjoyed all of them. If you're fussy and particular about what goes into your garden then you should avoid the regular robins at all costs. I winter sow and I have a large yard so they work for me. With the exception of those couple of boxes I have always found enough seeds to make the three-four dollars in postage worth it. It's just plain fun to get a box of seeds to pick through, that alone is worth the few dollars to me! I love some of the 'unwanted' seeds. I would never go buy a pack of snapdragons, but lo and behold, there they are for me in that box! I usually try to fix the box up before sending it on. If there are 5 packs of mixed morning glories, I might combine them into one (I don't grow MG's) and put in 4 of my own packets so the number doesn't decrease. Unwanted is a matter of opinion. I think MG's are junk. However, people grow them and love them! If someone put in a huge packet of something really nice, I'll trade out for it and then put half the packet back in because I don't need 50 seeds of something. Everyone grows common stuff in their yards (hence the term common) so it goes without saying they are going to end up in the box. Newbies play and most of their initial seeds come from donations from us! I used to think Shasta Daisy's were the bomb (sorry fellow robineers)! It's not the responsibility of the hostess to keep the box nice the whole trip. It's hard to just fill an initial box to send out. Everyone should help out and also be a bit more tolerant if you get the box from a newbie. If you have extra 'wanted' seeds, what's the harm in tossing them into the box? I have beautiful flowers but it's a round robin garden, lol. I have to avoid the named variety exchanges. Sorry to read you got a dog box fairydancer! A long time ago, I signed up for a robin and was the first to receive it. It turned out to be a gift and seed robin. The gifts were dirty junk laying around the host's house for years. (Same for the seeds in the box)! They don't work for me, people have different tastes. Some of them are expensive to mail around. I think if they were a little more specific and included a price range on the items they might work better. Perhaps a 'homemade trinkets' box with personalized items might be nice rather than shipping dollar store items around the country. If I was a hostess, I wouldn't feel comfortable mailing a box with 10 items valued at $20.00 an item. I've only joined in a couple of group swaps. I was really delighted when I opened one package because it was filled with all sorts of things I'd never heard of. Come to find out, it's because every single packet was for zone 7 and warmer! I would have rather just packed and sent my package of seeds to a newbie and only paid the postage one way. Now, I'm more careful about the swaps I sign up for. It's my responsibility to make sure the hostess will be able to fit my needs, too, so I'm not so disappointed.

a few thoughts to add to this excellect discussion. Does no one add sand? I've heard pros & cons. Also when you bury manure deeper than 8 inches it naturally mixes in with the soil well even if it's fresh. different animals produce manure with differnt nutrients. fowl from turkey and chicken farms and processing plants are super high in nitrogen but will grown giant greens and broccoli or burn up everything. You can get horse manure from stables and people who keep horses. Sheep and cow stuff from dairies and slaughter houses. Check with 4-H they can tell you who is raising animals and would love to get rid of all kinds of poop. I get great leaf mold in the fall when people leave bags of leaves on curbs in plastic bags. the leaves age just fine left alone in the bags all winter long. I've had difficulty with large amounts of pete moss in that it blows around quickly. If you can get neighbors un treated lawn clippings they are very good with some extra nitrogen.

Joe, The bar is there to keep the hole the correct size,I make mine 1-3/8" from the bottom of the hole to the bottom of the bar.The space above the bar is for ventilation.In these plans the bar is also being used as a hinge,the door(front of the box) would then lift up from the bottom.I myself prefer the door to swing down from the top.I only had the bar on the door,not going through the side of the box as shown in the plans,I then made my hinge on the bottom.I just used a seperate piece of the bar for the pin lock.For the bar and pin,I used a piece of 1/8"brass welding rod,but am sure you could use any 1/8"rod you can find,maybe aluminum.I guess you could have the bar like in the plans and still have your hinge on the bottom,but you would have to fish the bar through all the holes every time you opened the box. Matt

It appears Google had this answer. I did a basic search using the keywords "AVG WinZip" (sans quotes) and I readily found a link providing: "Please note that the WinZip setup tries to install AVG Security Toolbar and sets AVG secure search as your browser homepage. To avoid installing the toolbar, please choose custom installation during the setup and uncheck "Set, keep and protect AVG Secure Search as my homepage", "Set, keep and protect AVG Secure Search as my default search provider" and "Install AVG Security Toolbar" options." Based on the above, if it were me with this concern I would remove WinZip using REVO at the advanced setting. When doing so I would give it permission to remove anything it finds relating to WinZip. I would then run CCleaner's registry tool for any orphan entries. Finally, I would reinstall WinZip following the above instructions. DA