irisgirl, You can steal my threads anytime. As far as I'm concerned your question and dilemma are related to the discussion. :O) IMHO, you are probably not doing anything wrong. Your other seeds are sprouting right? And look at PV's experience. I will add that 4 years ago I did ws some Echs and none of them came up. I will sprinkle them in the container of moist potting mix and then mush them around a bit in the top 1/4 inch layer of soil so that some are under the soil and others are exposed. Nothing fancy about it. I'm sure that you will meet with success at one point. Keep trying. :O)

I would not use it. It is a food/green matter which is wonderful to use in compost, mulches and worked into the gardens (I do all three), but I would be wary of using it as a filler for potting soil since in that case it is not exposed to the gardening soil world of worms and the microherd. Once warm, in a potting soil environment, I can imagine it becoming moldy and possibly creating problems. I could be wrong because this is one place I've not gone with UCGs. I have been gardening extensively with UCGs in the last 4 or so years. As an example, today I turned a pile of compost which I made last week which contained 200lbs. of UCGs, 6 bags of shredded leaves, and several pails of seaweed. I also created another pile nearly identical to last week's and inoculated it with some of the week old compost as it had reached a temperature of 155F. I bring home 200 to 250 pounds of UCGs every week and use it to amend the soil in the gardens and on our lawn in many ways. I also cannot spend a fortune on potting soil every year but enjoy winter sowing so much that I need lots. Is there any place around you where you can buy your potting soil in bale form? I buy a bale of Promix every season for about $30.00. It is basically compressed potting soil and does the trick. I find mine at a store similar to Home Depot and can also get it at a garden center which is open year round for a bit higher price. If I know that things are tight financially, I will ask for it as a gift for Christmas or Valentine's Day (not kidding here) and will get it as such. Hopefully others will give more insight. I wish you many successes in your gardens. :O)

I love digging new beds - it's such an optimistic job. My *least* favorite chore is re-digging old beds, which I happen to be doing now, kicking myself all the while. Who knew that garden heliotrope, shasta daisies, campanula glomerata and siberian iris would all run amok in a mere 15 years. Toss in invading lawn grasses, annual weeds, and boisterous autumn clematis, compact firmly with carpenters' boots (while they are shingling the wall behind the garden), and you have a bona fide mess. No fun, no fun at all. Oh, I almost forgot. My really, truly least favorite chore is opening and paying my credit card bill. Shocking how much you can spend without even noticing - and on nothing but annuals and perennials. Makes squishing bugs feel like a picnic by comparison.

Wow - this thread has really taken off, hasnt it ? Thanks again to everyone for their suggestions. I am reasonably au fait with most of the suggestions for the feature tree, with the exception of the bottle tree, but plants such as Native Gardenia are something of an unknown. I am also very wary of the impact of the Rocky sun on many rainforest species, even those marked 'full sun' : establishing the microclimate which allows these plants to take full sun is probably better left to species such as acacia and melaleuca. Experience has taught me that there are exceptions, and the Penda in my last garden has gone from strength to strength in the furnace that is our afternoon sun - its currently alive with yellow flowers and is bushy right to its bootstraps. I have recommended the various E. Ficifolia / E. Ptychocarpa hybrids (now Corymbias, I believe) to my friend, but the grafted rootstock seems to constrain them to no more than 5-6 metres, and I believe that I need something more in the 12m plus range to shield the front of the house from the blistering afternoon sun. It also needs to be sufficiently dense at the top to make 'worthwhile' shade, without being a menace to people standing beneath it. Ultimately, it will come down to the stock that Fitzroy Nurseries have in May - most of the other nurseries just dont persist with anything larger than 14" pots. I'll let you know how I get on. Cheers, Artie