I completely disgree with the disagreement ;) Basing nutrient availability primarily on base cation ratios is out dated and poorly supported by research. There is something to competition of nutrients, but it's not nearly as important as making sure that you have sufficient amounts of each nutrient. That (and the fact that the BCR method results in over application much of the time) is why most labs have gone to a sufficiency factor system in favor of base cation ratios. Boat loads of studies have been done to support this. Here is a discussion which sites a good amount of support from a University of Wisconsin study: Oh look. Here it is. Note that the highest corn and soy bean yields were in soils with Ca:Mg ratios which showed magnesium at approximately 3 times higher than calcium (Holy cow! Can that be?!?) and potassium as much as five times higher than magnesium. (Whaaaa..?!?!) And there is plenty more out there showing the same stuff. The BCR stuff was championed by Bear et. al. (read: quacks) and their ideas have been all but dismissed except in myth, lore, and comedy skits. Oh yeah, all I said was not to sweat the sulfur in potassium sulfate in regards to pH. That sulfate is not going to have a huge effect on pH (if any) I say again, don't sweat the sulfur in potassium sulfate if that's they way you want to go. You may note that I recommended the greenwaste compost to bump up primarily potassium. I think that would be prudent for this year, based on the test. Actually, I never said don't sweat the soil test before, but you know what? I'm gonna say it now. Take note of the fact that you could use some potassium. Put in the compost, plant some plants and test again next year. Use this year's test as a base line and adjust from there. Yes, use the tests as a guide but don't freak yourself out over trying to get everything perfect in one shot. Although some adjustment certainly may be warranted after you've gone through a crop or two, plants tolerate very wide ranges of nutrient and chemical conditions and they might do just fine. By the way, if you depend on potassium and magnesium to increase your pH, you're gonna wait an awfully long time for very little change.

Clematis hybridizers have all sorts of motivations as to why they do what they do and how they go about approaching their intended goal. I'd venture to say that in the past most focused on floral effect - the size, shape and color of the flower and its associated parts - and left the development of the vine itself and its growing habit as a secondary byproduct. The Evison breeding program approaches clematis hybridization a bit differently. One of their intents was to develop very compact vines that display an ability to develop flowers all along the length of the vine rather than at the terminal growing points as most vines tend to do. Combining the genes of vines that bloom on both old and new wood is only one of the methods they employ (and I am not sophisticated enough in the specifics of clematis genes and the mechanics of hybridization to offer a better explanation). The results so far have produced a varied selection of smaller vines that tend not to develop the 'bare legs' of their taller growing cousins but rather produce growth points and lateral stems all along the length of the vine and each of these laterals has the ability to produce flowers in the same manner that the top growth does on more conventional clematis vines. And each of these flowering points has been developed to produce multiple (5-7+) flowers per stem. Hence the designation of "free-flowering". One of the corresponding characteristics of these newer vines is that they tend not to fit easily into any recognized pruning group, but are treated more as one does the herbaceous clematis, removing all growth down to a rather low level (even to the base) at the start of each season. Not all of the new Evison introductions have been bred for this attribute but my experience with several of those that have - 'Harlow Carr' and those of the Boulevard series (previously marketed as "patio" clematis) like 'Picardy' and 'Cezanne' - is that they do live up to the label of "free-flowering", producing continual blooms from midspring to frost. I've not even really noticed any 'flushes' - just a continuation of the initial bloom cycle throughout the growing season. As Miguel very validly points out, how long and how well any clematis will bloom for you has much to do with where and how its planted, the care it receives and your specific climate but some of these newer introductions do have - at least in my limited experience - a remarkable ability to produce a profusion of flowers virtually nonstop throughout the season. I think even Miguel would agree with me on 'Harlow Carr's powerful blooming capacity, irrespective of any hybridizer marketing hype :-) YMMV

I am not looking for heat source to be a primary heat source. We will be using the wood stove (and cheap abudant wood) for that. We want something that will be able to keep the house at 50 degrees or so when we are away and possible warm up the back kids' rooms. In our rental right now we use a tiny wood stove and have gas wall heaters set at around 58 degrees. The house is very far from air tight and has little insulation. The house is not an open floor plan like our new house. We are able to keep most of the rental house at 70+ when it is in the teens outside using the small stove. Problem is it does not have a long burn time (around 6 hours) and the house cools down quickly due to drafts. We are hoping our new house, being way more airtight and insulated, will be able to keep its temp up longer. We will also be purchasing a much nicer stove which has a longer burn time. We want something like our wall heaters now, but much more pleasing to look at. We wanted to do radiant floors, but at around 10K it is just not in the budget. We already will be spending 3K on the wood stove. The electric baseboard heaters look OK, but we use a ton of electric already (pond, hottub, aquariums, CPU, ect) and in CA electric is not cheap. I have heard the gas versions (if there is one) due not meet code to be used in a bedroom. Radiant Baseboards look real nice, just not sure how it will effect the budget. A decent water heater is around $300 while a boiler system looks to be aroudn $3000. I could be wrong!

Mary, the secondary market is what's behind the lack of liquidity in mortgage financing today. Due to delinquencies & poor quality ratings the secondary market has all but dried up making it more difficult for people to obtain mortgage financing. Definition: The secondary mortgage market allows banks to sell mortgages, giving them new funds to offer more mortgages to new borrowers. If banks had to keep these mortgages the full 15 or 30 years, they would soon use up all their funds, and potential homebuyers would have a more difficult time to find mortgage lenders. Many of the mortgages on the secondary market are bought by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. Other are packaged into mortgage-backed securities, and sold to investors. This market is called the 'secondary market'. It's 'secondary' because the purchaser of the mortgage is not the entity that originated the note/mortgage. Examples: Fannie Mae buys mortgages from banks, a process known as buying on the secondary mortgage market. Fannie & Freddie are crucial to mortgage financing. They are GSEs (Government Sponsored Entities) yet independant corporations traded on the NYSE. They are at the epicenter of yesterday's market convulsions. It is estimated that the two GSEs hold about $5T in mortgage assets. /tricia