I don't put any sulfur in the holes of the roses pictured. The other holes with sulfur didn't bloom well. My heavy clay is very retentive, there is no leaching here. Here's a quote from Nutrient Stewardship site: "Phosphorus is the nutrient most affected by pH. ..Nitrogen, Potassium, and sulfur are less affected. At alkaline pH values, greater than pH 7.5, phosphate ions tend to react quickly with calcium (Ca) and magnesium (Mg) to form less soluble compounds. At acidic pH values, phosphate ions react with aluminum (Al) and iron (Fe) to again form less soluble compounds." It's good to test if one's tap water is alkaline, some cities add lime to water so pipes won't corrode. Calcium in lime will bind with phosphorus, and less is available. In my 12 years of growing flowers in pots, the year that I got continuous MOST blooms despite my pH 8 water was when I used high phosphorus SOLUBLE fertilizer, and low nitrogen. Granular phosphorus like bone meal and 46% superphosphate are useless in the planting hole here in alkaline clay. My results confirmed what University of Colorado stated "bone meal and rock phosphate can only be utilized at or below pH 7". My pH 7.7 soil was tested most deficient in phosphorus. Here's a quote from David Neal, CEO of Dyna-Grow Plant Nutrition in CA: "There is some evidence to believe that low N helps to convince a plant to stop its vegetative growth and move into its reproductive phase (flowering), but environmental factors are probably more important. P is typically 5th or 6th in order of importance of the six macronutrients. There is little scientific justification for higher P formulas, but marketing does come into play ...." He's right, just a tiny bit of SOLUBLE phosphorus made more blooms and more roots - but beyond that is wasteful. The site, Robert Morris NOBLE plant foundation, rated the mobility of NPK: "Let's compare the mobility of NPK on a scale of 1 to 10. Nitrogen is a 10 ... extremely mobile and can be lost to leaching. Potassium is a 3. It has limited movement in the soil. Phosphorus has a rating of 1. It is immobile in the soil and is likely to stay wherever it is placed." Here is a link that might be useful: Soil pH and availability of plant nutrients

Joy of Pickling has a pickled red cabbage. I haven't tried it but the batch is small enough you could give it a shot without much risk. Lots of spices in this, but of course they could be reduced or eliminated if you want something plainer. 2 1/4 lbs. trimmed red cabbage, shredded 1 T. pickling salt 1/2 tsp. whole cloves 1/2 tsp. blade mace (preferred) or small pieces nutmeg 1/2 tsp. whole allspice 1/2 tsp. black peppercorns 1/2 ts. celery seeds One 1-inch cinnamon stick 1 1/3 c. red wine vinegar 1/4 c. brown sugar 4 tsp. mustard seeds (yellow) Toss cabbage with salt. Cover and let stand in a cool place 8-12 hours. Combine vinegar, sugar and mustard seeds in a nonreactive pan. Tie other spices in a spice bag and add them. Bring to boil and simmer 5 minutes. Let cool. Drain cabbage thoroughly then pack into two pint jars. Pour cooled liquid over cabbage. Divide evenly between the two jars and if there isn't enough to cover the cabbage, top off with vinegar. Close jars and process BWB 20 minutes. Store at least 3 weeks before eating. I hope you do try this, Marcia, and let us know the results. Sounds interesting. Carol

Hi Prairie_north: Very pretty bloom on your mini-rose. Thank you for the l info. that cracked corn changed from pink (acidic) to purple (neutral) fast. I'm happy with cracked corn in the planting hole (did that last year), so is Momscottagegarden (clay soil). I like what you wrote: "The bed around it was originally amended with peat moss, and has cedar shavings on top. Today I pushed the shavings away, dug up the soil around it, put down some sheep manure, and red lava rock." Peat moss mixed with clay becomes hardened a year later. Cedar shavings is acidic (pH 4) that would leak acid down when it rains (pH of rain is 5.6). Since mini-rose is own-root, the roots are nearer the surface, and is sensitive to acid leaching down. Own-roots do best with organic fertilizer, since it's nearer the surface ... some are wimpy like alfalfa sprouts, versus big-woody-bush-trunk Dr. Huey. Red lava rock is a strong buffer at pH 8. I mulched roses with that during our wet months .. kept roses clean. Blooming takes up lots of potassium & calcium to make those firm petals. After blooming, potassium and calcium are both depleted, plus rain leaches out potassium & calcium & trace elements. Red-lava rock in the planting hole, plus on top provide a continuous supply of potassium to prevent diseases, plus more blooms. Calcium is a strong buffer: I use that in many ways: as granular gypsum (calcium sulfate) to break up clay. If it rains a lot, I put gypsum on top of red-lava-rock. But for Dr. Huey-rootstock, I put dolomitic lime on top, since Dr. Huey likes it alkaline. Best ratio in hydroponics setting is equal nitrogen to potassium, 1/2 phosphorus, and 1/2 calcium. I burnt a few own-roots with either salty manure in hot weather, or high-phosphorus fertilizer like bone meal. My best result in hot weather is alfalfa hay for nitrogen. Timothy hay is much softer, easier to mulch .. that's what I plan to test next. I got amazing result mulching with alfalfa hay in hot weather, best nitrogen-source ever, which beat anything I tested: blood meal, compost, Milorganite, alfalfa pellets, alfalfa meal, corn meal. The problem with alfalfa in smaller particles: they gunk up on top, either souring, or hardening clay further. Alfalfa hay is fluffy, which cools and shade the roots in hot sun, plus it's a strong buffer: neutralize both acidic rain, and alkaline tap water.

Mine doesn't seem to be overly salty either, but I do rinse it, then sprinkle the spices over top and most of the time I add a bit of water to the bottom of the dutch oven, more water if it's the crockpot. Peppi, it's one of those "5 ingredient" recipes and I didn't even mean it to be. (grin) I chop up the corned beef, dice some potatoes and onions. Throw some fat into a frying pan, add the onions and potatoes and stir until nicely browned. Add the chopped corn beef and some beef broth, I use my home canned stuff and use maybe a cup. Put a lid on and cook until the potatoes are tender. At this point it's ready to serve with some nice over easy eggs, but the girls liked a crunchy bottom layer. So I dumped out the hash, added butter to the hot pan, put the hash back in, made wells for eggs and put the lid back on. By the time the eggs were done the bottom was starting to crisp up and it was perfect. I've never used any measurements and the corned beef is salty and spicy enough that I only occasionally add a grind of black pepper when serving it. I use as many potatoes as I want servings, I can stretch just a little bit of corned beef this way or add a lot if I have some that I need to use up. I've added cabbage or parsnips at various times, I really like the added sweetness from the parsnips but Elery likes the original potato and onion version. It's really simple, just fried potatoes and onions and some leftover corned beef, but it's just the way we like it. We just got the cooktop installed, but no electricity yet for the ignitors, so it's probably going to be the crockpot... Annie