It is interesting, but I still lean away from MiracleGro. I have 3 bags left from my last purchase, and when it's gone, that'll be the end of it. Since most of the things I'm growing in pots are grasses, I'd rather add the ferts myself. I just bought a couple 2.8 cubic foot bags of Metro-Mix 510 from my nursery supply wholesaler, and it's really nice stuff so far. It's very light and porous, and it has an undefined "starter nutrient charge" in it's list of ingredients. I emailed the manufacturer to see if they could tell me what it consists of. At $13.50 per bag, it isn't cheap, but it's consistency is perfect for pots and winter sowing. I'm going to try some in seed flats soon, and will report on it's performance.

What an interesting experiment! Citrus and Orchids, which prefer dryer soil and Alocasias which thrive in bogs, all love CHCS! I have lots of tropical fruit trees in CHCs and all have outperformed others in the ground or in regular potting mix. Roots in CHCs hold them so tightly so it can be near impossible to separate rootball from CHCs. Alocasias/Colocasias are much appreciated here. There are common ones and also many rare and beautiful ones. I have Borneo Giant- which develops leaves 12' long and up to 6' wide. I also have some that only get 6-10' tall, growing in the swampy area of the property. Thanks for sharing your experience with the chips vs potting soil. Lisa

Kasha - I love mixing my own colors, and do it in an "abbreviated" way often, which I'll explain in a minute. But it true that if you want a large quantity of your own mixed color, after experimenting to find the color inputs you'll need to be brave and mix all of what you need at once because truly it is virtually impossible to match your own color exactly later on. I learned about color theory and paint color mixing from a couple of classes that I took at UCLA extension design program, one in color theory and another in faux painting. The faux painting class was taught by an excellent professional who mixed virtually all his own color from scratch and taught us how he did it. He *weighed* the color pigments in order to match his creations later, and even this, with a special and expensive scale, was imperfect (although very good). I've never gotten the scale myself as I'm only a DYI faux painter. However I've been doing a lot of faux over the last year as we've been remodeling an adobe house in Santa Fe that has all hand troweled plaster walls inside, which we've commissioned as part of the remodel. Some are peach colored plaster (the "old" structolite) and some are off white (the "natural" structolite, that's all that is available now). The plaster walls have lots of natural varigations in color in them. But even so, the plasterers leave faults that show up as, for example, a whole "picture" in white of their trowel on a peach wall, or rust spots that seep thru the plaster from the netting underneath. And, we've had some changes made in the plaster, such as replacint a window with a french door, which leaves a line in the surrounding area. In Santa Fe, faux painters are routinely used to fix these faults in the plaster, by making them invisible via spot faux painting that imitates the varigated look of the unpainted walls. This is what I've learned to do, and thank heavens for the classes I took. We've saved lots of $$, and it's fun to boot! Here's what I do, and you might be able to do something similar. I take a piece of the plaster I want to match to my favorite local paint store, in my case Benjamin Moore paints. They match it, and I specify the gloss level to match the clear sealer gloss I've already put on the wall. I use this paint as the base for my faux work. I am able to do this because each time I make sure that I get the formula for the paint that they create, so that I understand the color components and their relative amounts. For example, the peach paint they made for me is made with a pastel base (white, I know now from Faron), and to this is added red oxide, yellow oxide and a tiny bit of black. I put some of this paint in my pallette tray along with separate amounts of the component colorants. I then mix on the spot various "versions" of the original paint to get the varigations in color that I'm looking for on a particular spot of wall. So if you have a color that is close to what you are looking for and can find out the color components, you can experiment with adding more of any of them to see if you can get closer to what you want. It's trial and error but in my experience after a while you come to know what, say in my case, more red oxide will do to the base color, or what effect a little more black will have. If you can focus on a particular color as a base, you can really come to understand how to create variations in it. As to obtaining the colorants themselves, I have a set of 14, 16 oz containers of universal colorant that I put together during the class several years ago. 16 oz containers are, I have come to realize, *huge* for this type of work and I will never use all of it in 5 lifetimes. The brand is Proline, and I bought it at a local paint store in L.A.. But you can probably order it or something similar online. Our instructor emphasized that it's important to have a pretty good variety of color to start, if you want to blend your own color from scratch, as what do you do when you don't have something that you need right then. (I did do some of this before I started working from a base of pre-made paint.) Anyway, here are the colors I have, that he said were the basics. The numbers are the Proline color numbers: PL33A: LF Yellow Med. PL-36: Permanent Violet PL-3: Raw Umber PL-4: Burnt Umber PL-15: Chrome Oxide (a green) PL-11: Thalo Blue PL--9: Permanent Green Med. PL-18: Raw Sienna PL-14: Bulletin Red PL-12: Thalo Green PL-50: White PL-6: Red Oxide PL-16: Lampblack PL-2: Yellow Oxide. I also got a tube of oil paint in Burnt Sienna. Good luck! Using colorants is really fun! Katie

Y'all don't know a thing about rentals! Not sure how you arrived at that pronouncement. Suspect misinterpretation. Speaking for myself, if I didn't know a thing about rentals or what I was doing this ship would have sunk long ago. We have dozens of low income rentals (section 8, trailers, college students) and if a fist through the wall was the worst, we would be so grateful! To clarify: my comment about holes punched in walls being worst case scenario was related to walls only, as the original question is in regard to wall paint. I could fill a book with stories of damages typically caused by anger, too much alcohol, too much alcohol combined with anger, sheer ignorance, the guy who fancies himself Johnny Handyman (those are dangerous ones, literally) and general lack of regard for someone else's property. How to avoid bug infestation? Do inspections (or have mgmt do it). I'm relieved to say we've never once had that issue. I typically do 2 formal inspections per year (announced as such). But I'm in homes more frequently for repairs, etc. and always scan for anything out of the ordinary while I'm there. Not talking dust or a pile of clothes on the floor, it's good to learn to train our eyes to see beyond that and look for structural damage, potential problems, etc. acoreana: Just wanted to offer some suggestions. (My experience comes from owning multiple single family dwellings of 'starter home' real estate variety. So it's middle of the road rental property - not luxury, not low income.) Not trying to be negative, just spare you some potential grief. ;) Fixing up a rental can be fulfilling to the decor lover inside us. But putting too much $ into details is not really a winning situation unless your local market allows you to command rents that offset costs of high end purchases and the property itself calls for high end amenities. If you're a bargain hunter, that's a plus. Nothing is more fulfilling to me than finding something for a steal that's ideal for a rental, makes it nice without being out of alignment cost-wise. I've gotten nice light fixtures for next to nothing on closeout sale, bath mirrors and medicine cabinets for a song at store closings, etc. It does pay to keep an eye out for bargains of that variety! Nicer presentation and if it does get trashed, it's not a big financial loss. The most important point I wanted to make is you never really know how people live until you get them inside your property. I have had tenants that looked like a landlord's dream on paper and a couple of those turned out to be not so great tenants. One 'perfect' couple on paper turned out to be my worst nightmare (and they were both in need of some serious anger management sessions). Conversely, I've had tenants with not so good credit, hit on hard times because of circumstances they couldn't control, turned away by other landlords. I opted to give them a chance to get back on their feet and in return they turned out to be some of my most awesome tenants. If you're brand new to this you'll probably make some mistakes at first, but those are valuable learning experiences. I'm not the big ole meanie type, and can't play that role well, but have learned that it's possible to be cordial and maintain control at the same time. I could write volumes on damages. It's not typical. But sadly it's not rare, either. Each instance has taught me a lesson. I've got some screening methods I use that only cost some time and save a lot of future grief. If you're interested, email me ;) But to end on a positive note, for every troublesome tenant I've had the misfortune to encounter, there are far more good ones. Right now I've got great tenants in all the properties, they're happy, I'm happy, life is good (and quiet)! ;D