Nice rant but it really has nothing to do with this thread. The "off chance" was the off chance that Bonide Fruit Tree would actually do anything about any disease because it is well known that it doesn't have enough strength do much for any disease or insect. I know what the disease problems were, a little rust and a lot of scab but I had given up on fixing them further this year because of all the rain. I was going to spray malathion for Apple Maggot anyway and the Bonide has worked with that in the past so I decided to try that since it might offer disease protection too. You know, it was you who threw out a useless rant when I had originally asked what malathion damage to McIntosh looked like, my post got bumped down and was never answered because of your rant. Perhaps if it was allowed to stay at the top of the page until someone who had actually seen malathion damage to McIntosh answered I would have not damaged my apples this year with the Bonide or "contaminated the environment with needless pesticide". (FYI, The pesticide wasn't the needless part the fungicide was. The malathion was going to be sprayed one way or another.) So I sarcastically thank you for your "help" on this issue last year, and you only have yourself to thank for me needlessly spraying the Bonide, contaminating the environment and hurting the keeping qualities of my apples. I know you like to set yourself up as a chemical expert but if you don't have a real answer you really should hold your tongue until an answer is offered so the thread stays at the top of the page, which appropriately has nothing to do with your reply in this thread since I was offering information to my own unanswered question and not asking a question.

It never fails to amaze me what organic molecules bound up in protein cell walls exhibit in response to stimuli. Most folks tend to believe that plants are inanimate for the most part, except for growth. Yet flowers open, close and follow the sun like little moving radar dishes, leaves fold or curl and some plants recoil to touch. The thing plants lack is the more complex capacity to respond which we find in fauna and call sentience. And they are damn slow about their movements, blushes and other responses. It's often hard to tell why they respond and what they are responding to. The 'nastic' responses aren't always easy to peg, let alone the 'pathologic' or illness responses. I'm not the guy with 4 years of plant science like Huey, but it does seem odd to me that a plant should extend more energy at a time when its metabolic ability to produce energy is taxed, ie. the accelerated growth of larger and in the case of the "Ice Cream" and "Super Dwarf", darker leaves in shade. I questioned for some time his statement about anthocyanins producing the zebra bars on the zebrinas as it seemed odd to me that the zebra bars were being produced on the "Ice Cream" banana only now, precisely as a response to the diminished light of partial shade. If the Zebrina lives naturally in full sun, then why does the "Ice Cream" banana produce the bars when subjected to shade? There seems to be a contradiction here. Do Autumn leaves turn color due to reduced light as the Solar azimuth increases or due to cold or both? Are the zebra bars a similar response? I don't think my banana are in danger of illness. They do get light. It is just not the full on direct UV hard light. Instead they get the diffuse reflected light that comes in the Patio windows. Granted, the intensity of this light is much less than the direct light, especially at the current seasonal low azimuth of the Sun. It must be worse for folks with Banana farther north and their tactics of overwintering their corms in storage may be very necessary. Those folks also get more cloud cover than we get in BKF. Cloud cover is rare here, although as it gets colder, we may see Tule fog that hangs on the ground till late morning or longer. I have developed however, a great appreciation for the harshness of solar radiation. Despite our protective magnetic, atmospheric and ozone planetary shield, the natural summer radiation levels are indeed harmful and destructive to those amazing organic molecules I referred to above. There may be some plants that require the full dosage, but I think some shade, even from cloud cover is often the means for healing or even better health. I grant you, that certain pathogens are better able to survive in shade and those, fungis, molds, viruses etc., may be causal to plant illness and that should rightfully be a concern. But I think the metabolic needs will be met in my overwintering scheme. I think I can get by here in BKF with my current strategy of overwintering inside. The shortest day of the year is less than 30 days away, December 21st. After that we may get colder, but will start seeing longer days again. Grow lights are an option if I think I need them. I am committed to continue as I have started and should things get ugly, well ... I suppose in any case, I'll both learn from the experience and be able to provide folks in this forum a useful example. Fingers are crossed.

it takes weeks, even months for sulfur to take effect... and, what's more, here in fla it needs to be reapplied frequently (at least once a year). my bed went from 5.5 to 7 in a year. with just two plants, i would, were i you, consider 1) going to a nursery and buying a huge tree pot; 2) fill it to the top with pine nuggets; 3) dump in a mix of compost and peat--filling in the space among the nuggets (you'll be surprised how much will fit in there); 4) plant the blueberries together in the same pot.

I was just thinking the same thing yesterday while eating my first Sungolds and Sweet Million. But then again when there are more to pick I let them sit on the vine a little longer and eat them when they are a bit riper. Perhaps I'm just in to much of a hurry to pick the first ones.