We're going to be here painting and overseeing the flooring installs, ect until the end of July. The aquariums are in the new place because we couldn't paint with them in this house. I hope my fish are ok! I transported my lovely pair of rainbow kribensis in a gallon jar on the floor of the truck between my feet, though that would be the safest. By the time we got there, the water was hot and they looked really bad. Had to cool them quickly by sitting the jar in a sink of cool water, without shocking them. They had perked up a lot by the time we were done unloading. We set up the aquariums as soon as we got there and acclimated the fish to the new water for a bit, then loosing them in their tanks. One of the silver dollars must have beaten himself up a bit in the bucket during the ride because he knocked off a bit of his dorsal fin.Ideally, we would have stayed overnight to observe, but the boys (our dogs) were here and probably needed to go out for 'walkies'. Jeff is going by tomorrow to check on the finny children. Today, I'm doing the lawn and cleaning the pond here. I'm really going to miss my pond. Sorry for the ramble, I need coffee! Pam

The "Ought"s?? As for the double-dealing ... while Madoff as an individual is more apparent, he didn't cause the Fed. gov't. to throw in all of that money that they didn't have, to avert having a financial debacle, which they say would have resulted had they not bailed out the Big Banks that were "too big to fail". And they're even bigger now, as some of the former biggies disappeared. It'll take years (more likely decades) to pay off that huge debt ... that we're loading on to the backs of our kids/grandkids. Madoff went to jail ... his son just committed suicide ... ... but the guys in the Big Banks ... ... figure that, instead of at least getting fired, or, more deservedly, going to jail ... ... they not only get to keep their jobs ... ... but they have a right to those huge year-end bonuses!! Let's point the finger of blame where it belongs. "Let the market decide ..."? But - the market didn't slaughter them - they got bailed out. And you taxpaying guys are getting stuck with the tab. I figure that I have some cause to bi!ch - my shares in a stable Canadian bank (more heavily regulateed) went from over $100. to about $40.00 ... but, having about half way recovered ... they're still afloat. ole joyful

Reading lots of posts (and not just the Harbor Freight posts) is a very good idea, because you're starting on a fun adventure, but there really is a lot to learn! First, most importantly, if you get 60-70 mph gusts at times (we have bad winds too) you'll definitely need to reinforce your HFGH to withstand the winds. Also, you'll need to secure the poly panels with more than the clips provided in the kit; I recommend adding a few screws per panel, going through the polycarbonate and into the greenhouse frame. Some people use caulk to secure the panels. If we hadn't read about these modifications here, 8 years ago, our HFGH would definitely not have survived. These kits are a great value, and mine has served me well for years, year round. But you do have to make modifications, or the structure will almost certainly sustain wind damage. There are many sad older threads in this forum from people who were not aware of the needs to make these modifications, and sometimes they lose the entire greenhouse. That's why the Harbor Freight kits are not widely respected among many hobby greenhouse owners, to be honest. Building it only as per the manual is usually not enough. You may have already read about this weakness of the kit, and taken care of these steps, but just in case, here's a link to my blog about building our own 10x12 Harbor Freight greenhouse. I gathered these ideas from other Gardenweb members when the 10x12 kit first came out, and wrote the blog to share them with others. Building our 10x12 Harbor Freight Greenhouse Your needs for heating and cooling depend a lot on how you plan to use the greenhouse (keep plants in there year round?) I live in southern New Mexico. Our highs are higher than yours, and our lows are lower. But I would imagine you'll need shadecloth of some kind for the roof at least, and also an exhaust fan to aid with cooling, and probably other fans to help keep the air moving, 24/7. I use two small electric heaters for winter heat. I don't believe you will be able to power electric heaters or an electric exhaust fan with only a solar panel, however. This website has two different calculators to determine the heating and cooling needs for your greenhouse, depending on your climate and glazing materials. I used it to start to get a rough idea for what we needed, when we built our greenhouse. (Your HFGH uses 4mm twinwall polycarbonate, when you input the type of glazing into the calculator.) There are likely much more sophisticated calculators on the web, but these might get you started: Greenhouse heater size calculator Greenhouse fan size calculator First, please make sure that your panels are safely secured to your greenhouse frame, and I hope you'll consider some of the additional interior bracing as shown in my blog (I hate unhappy endings.) There are other wonderful blogs about the HFGH online too; just do a Google search, to see what folks have done. Then, you can start working on the more generalized questions (heating, cooling, shadecloth, benches, etc) that apply to any type of hobby greenhouse. Some things you can figure out ahead of time with careful reading, and other things will become apparent through trial and error, as our greenhouses, plants, and climates all differ. I hope you have fun along the way!

That happened to me with a wild duck, a coon had destroyed the nest but missed two eggs. I'm guessing it was less than 24 hours, I kept them inside the garage and kept them on a hot water bottle, changed it two times every day, before school and when I got home, amazingly they hatched.