Because this is the progression of the disease, blaze. Dr. Dodds said it's like "chasing a ghost", due to the 2 year lag time between infection and symptoms. And it is impossible to control what other countries do. We, the United States, can try to apply pressure in various ways - political, economic, etc - but that doesn't always mean countries will comply. Here's part of the problem happening in other countries who are ahead of us with HLB infections (and we are hoping this does not happen in the US, as it will escalate the issue in logarithmic proportions): HLB strikes and begins to create a reduction in commercial production. Commercial growers find they have to start replacing trees. The demand on commercial nurseries goes way up. Testing budwood for HLB becomes less than optimal and infected NEW trees start going out. Nothing is seen for 2 years because a tree doesn't become symptomatic for at least 2 years, more trees are infected due to new infected trees available for the ACP to visit and then spread the disease. Yes, the branch of the tree (just a branch) that came up positive from HLB was a branch of a Chinese pommelo cultivar that is not available here in the USA. No one is stating how that budwood got here, but suspicions are that it was brought in illegally. But, it's too late now to do anything about it, or at least this tree. The inspectors are inspecting ALL the trees that this person may have grafted, or within this small Chinese community to make sure there isn't another infected grafted tree. The citrus industry is trying to increase public awareness. This does help, but there are still people out there who think the rules are not written for them and will continue to conduct themselves in ways that will increase our risk for spreading HLB. And Dr. Mirkov (John, this is your guy at Texas A&M) who happens to be a past grad student of Dr. Dodds, is the one leading the research on using a couple of "protection" spinich genes, and inserting them into a number of citrus cultivars. He has had excellent success. This is one of the research projects I alluded to in my previous post. But no, this doesn't do anything to save current citrus trees from infection and ultimate death. And, you can only create so many immune cultivars. So far, he has created 2 grapefruits, I think 3 oranges and a mandarin. Maybe a lemon. There are thousands of citrus cultivars out there. And, this is clearly creating a genetically modified (GM) tree, which has its own issues with acceptability amongst a certain group of clients, both here and in other areas of the world. But, as Dr. Dodds also mentioned, with nearly complete certainty, he stated the "cure" will involve genetic modification in some manner. There are some other extremely promising research projects going on, one of which I would love to be a part of. It is a project where the researchers are trying to use a modified version of the tristeza virus as a "silver bullet" to kill the HLB bacteria. The idea is to intentionally infect trees with this modified tristeza virus that will interrupt the HLB bacteria (Candidactus Liberibacter sp.) and prevent it from replicating, thus killing it. It is the most fascinating research out there, I think, and, if they can swing this, it is a "cure" for current infected citrus, as well as "vaccinating" healthy citrus. This is very, very cool, and very clever I think. If anyone is interested in following the current research in the citrus industry, you'll want to bookmark the link, below. These are the "big guys" in citrus research. You can also subscribe to "Citrograph" and read up on all the work being done around all citrus pathogens, including HLB. There are many projects going on, both on the plant pathology side of HLB as well as on the entomology side to try to control or eradicate the ACP. You have 3 approaches to take when trying to control or get rid of a disease: develop resistant/immune cultivars, kill or disable the disease itself, or go after the vector. There are research projects going on, on all levels, so I imagine there will be multiple successful options within the next 3 to 4 years. Lastly, if you have an iPhone, there's a new app you can download for free from the Save Our Citrus website: http://saveourcitrus.org/index.php/soc-iphone-app They're working on an Android version, but for now, if you have an iPhone or iPad, this is a nice informational app you can put on your device. Patty S. Here is a link that might be useful: Citrus Research Program

Been on both sides myself. Raise nicely middle class, married to a working fellow-we had kids and a nice, comfy life-until he got involved with drugs and I had to literally flee in the middle of the night with my children and two suitcases. From there I was a single mother on welfare. And let me tell you, unless you have been there-you have NO WAY to know what it is like. You DO NOT have everything 'free'. I was allotted a certain amount each month for foodstamps (fortunately my children were small so I was able to make it stretch the month but we ate a lot of pasta), no housing assistance, so I had to live in a crappy little apartment in a shady part of town (it was all I could afford-and I didn't have to come up with first & last months rent plus a huge deposit). We had no TV, my car was running on USED motor oil so we walked almost everywhere we had to go-couldn't afford to spend what little money I had on gas or bus fare. I did laundry in the sink before the next check came so I could afford to get it all to the laundromat. I had to beg neighbors for diapers when my son ran out because he had diarreah and I couldn't afford to buy new ones. My kids had medical care, but I did not. I suffered with an abcess tooth until I found a dentist willing to work with me on payments. I hated grocery shopping because of the scornful glares I'd get from strangers. People staring into my cart to see what I'd bought. I couldn't get a bank account because I didn't have enough money to cover the monthly minimum, so I had to go to the store to get money orders to pay my bills. The remainder of the cash I had to keep on hand-it's disenhartening to realize you have $83 to get thru the month on-since food stamps doesn't buy non-food items. I wanted to work-I'd worked since I was 15, but I could not afford clothing to wear to an interview, much less day care. (also try finding day care for an infant). I got a very, very lucky break-my caseworker knew I was smart and had a work history, so I was offered a temporary job and I'd get day care assistance. Of course, the income counted against the food stamps, but at least I was able to pay every bill every month. From there I worked my way up the ladder (thanks to my work experience backround) and am where I am today-back into solidly middle class. I did know a few people who gamed the system-but that was the exception. And let me tell you-that gaming doesn't lead to a comfy life-they STILL live on less than 15K a year. As to having kids-yes-that is a BIG problem-made worse by the fact that access to birth control has been made virtually impossible in all but the most populous areas. (a different soap box). I was lucky that I had had a very strong backround-I was able to make that time on welfare temporary-but I was almost beaten by the system, and let me tell you, it's easy to fall into that trap, especially if you know of no other life. No one extends a hand to the destitute. There may be one or two people who make a brief offer-but they're burnt out so fast-and there are so many to try to help, it's overwhelming. I tell you, I even had a dentist chastize me loudly because we were 10 minutes late to the appointment. In front of the entire lobby he berated me-saying that I was lucky that he was even seeing my kids-he was taking a loss by seeing welfare patients. And the time I was on jury duty-and in the jury room the discussion about the defendant...the jurors were already convicting him because he got food stamps so he must be a criminal (he was eventually convicted, but only because the evidence was overwhelming) and when I told this group that I also got food stamps, they were shocked-I didn't fit the profile. (why, because I was clean and educated?) Sorry for the rant, my 2 cents. I just want to say that unless you've been there, you cannot imagine what it is like to be impoverished and downtrodden.

FOAS - try it with pork. I stuffed a pork chop with onions, garlic and mushrooms, then put bay and smoked paprika on the outside. The braising juice was white whine and pork broth. I've also sprinkled in on roasted potatoes, green beans, and added it to ground beed that was then used to stuff baby zucchini. It's also good on egg dishes. (I keep both sweet and sharp, snoked and regular, and I'm always sprinkling it on somethign just to see how it goes. I've heard it is good sprinkled on oysters, but I don't do oysters so can't verify that. If you click on the link and go to the bottom of the page, there are some recipes using the Spanish hot smoked paprika. If you have the sweet, just do a search for sweet and there will be recipes at that bottom of that page, too. I think what tweaked me about the tone of the article is that they are writing it as if pimenton is something different and more exotic (and therefore snooty and high brow) than paprika. They would have been more forthright to say "The problem isn't paprika; the problem is you bought low-quality paprika and kept it for ten years. Go out and buy some of the good stuff and you'll be pleasantly surprised." Here is a link that might be useful: recipes using paprika.

I can't quite see why a computer can't extrapolate and "fill in the dots" to blow up low res picture fairly accurately. You can fill in the dots and enlarge a photo as long as you have enough original information to begin with. When we view a photo we hold it or stand back a distance that is relative to the photo's size. As the photo gets bigger we keep backing up. As we back up the requirement for fine detail in the photo goes down (our eye sight doesn't improve as we back up). Therefore there should be a "content threshold" for photos so that we can expect to enlarge them to whatever size and they'll still look good. For digital cameras that content threshold is between 5 and 6 megapixels. 3 and 4 megapixel photos will eventaully collapse but they're close enough to the threshold that they will hang in there for a long time. I've made 16x20 inch prints from 3 meagpixel photos that looked great. Someone with "photographer's disease" could walk up to a 16x20 print from a 3 megapixel file, stick their nose in it, and claim, "it's not sharp." They need help. There are two high end competing algorithms used to interpolate up the content of a digital image. Photoshop uses the bicubic interpolation algorithm and Genuine Fractals uses a fractal interpolation algorithm. The photos below are big, but necessary so you can see. I took an image from an 8 meagpixel camera and reduced it's content to 1.6 megapixel and .5 megapixel equivalents. Then I used Photoshop (PS) and Genuine Fractals to interpolate those photos back to the resolution of the original. The 1.6 megapixel file was enlarged over 200% to get back to the 8 megapixel original res. GF did an amazing job and there's no way you'd see a differenece in an 8x10 print between the original and the 1.6 megapixel file -- a little sharpening applied to the interpolated 1.6 megapixel file and it's going to look great. .5 megapixels is just too little information to work with. Joe has made this point a few times as I recall and he's right: Given average amateur usage (4x6 prints with occasional enlargements to 8x10), a quality 3 megapixel camera and good software will do the job. At 6 megapixel you've reached content threshold so that with the right software your photo can be enlarged to highway billboard size and look good. Why an 8 to 10 megapixel camera? -- the freedom to crop the image down and still have content threshold.