Very, very nice garden horses. You paint wonderfully. The one already in the garden is looking really nice. Please post pics of them when you are completely finished. Sal

Wow, lots of info. I have to agree with most of what people are saying. Underlay is intended for 'under' the liner, but it is a great tool for using chunks under large rocks to add more cushion and limit tears in the liner. I'd suggest pulling it out also, its just going to become an issue with vacuuming and maintenance. Plants, potted or not, will eventually work into the underlay and become a nightmare to maintain. There is no reason for it to be over everything, and quite a few reasons to get rid of it. As far as the white lines and logos on firestone liner, it all get a carpet of algae so it disappears anyway so don't let that be a reason to not pull it out. Obviously you can do what ever you want, but the work of yanking it out now will be a fraction of the problems it causes in the long run. Sorry if this is bad news to you, but you'll be glad you did pull it later. Also I'm from the no rock school also, and sand would be even worse. If this is a 'natural' pond that you are planning on doing nothing to, thats a completely different story. There are benefits to a lot of media on the bottom with different applications. But if you want a pretty 'water garden' I've never understood putting rocks on the bottom. Maintenance nightmare! Anaerobic, sulfur smelling, black gunk is all that will give you without massive filtration.

Aw shucks, thanks folks! ":^), Yeah I think that tilling it two or three times before the final time definitely is a big factor in making good compost like that, because it does help break it down but it also mixes it thoroughly and aerates it too. I went thru an evolutionary process to arrive at using my tiller. I tried turning with a fork, poking holes with a big crow bar, burying a perforated pipe in the pile and then used my and drilling numerous holes in the pile. Each of those approaches will make compost, given time, were progressively better, but took varying amounts of physical exertion, and my supply of that was limited. I decided to use what ever mechanical means I had available to do the job in an agressive manner and it paid off well. I do not use much fossil fuel at all, it only takes a few minutes to till the pile up, and even less to pile it back up with my little on my garden tractor. I also had a little brainstorm and made a to work on the lift on the garden tractor to fluff the pile with in between tillings. It also doubles as a fork lift on a limited scale. (I just enjoy playing around with my cutting tools and welder and making useful, functional stuff like that, not to mention saving labor and enabling me to do stuff that I could not otherwise do, The other factors are lots and lots of shredded oak leaves and I have been very fortunate to obtain those pick up loads of about every imaginable kind of fruits and veggies from the supermarket dumpster too. Now they have locked them off. The manager said to call him a couple of hours in advance when composting time comes around again and he will save back some garbage cans of the good stuff for me. I hope that he is still there when I am ready again, if not I will be back to using horse manure (which is hard to beat) along with what ever else I can scrounge up. Right now I am just burying my kitchen scraps and a little bit of garden waste, but that is breaking down and working. Happy composting and gardening to you all. Bill P.

I found this elsewhere: "Q: I want to make all my ugly plastic planting pots look like concrete pots. How can I do this? A: There's an easy way and a not-so-easy way to accomplish this look. Let's go with the easy way. There are several products on the market that can be sprayed on to create that concrete look. One I like in particular is a spray paint from Krylon. Simply clean and dry the pot, then spray the surface. You will have a concrete look in no time. If you want to be a little crafty and add some dimension, spread on a plaster compound and cover it with sand. Let that dry, and then paint the entire pot." I couldn't find any paint by Krylon that said "concrete look", maybe you will have better luck. If you wanted a smooth concrete look maybe you could use a flat grey primer then lightly sponge with just a shade darker (or lighter)?