Does the free wheeling (bypass) valve operate smoothly in & out when you perform the purge, or if you are doing it to roll the tractor by hand? If the bypass valve does not move freely, and "click" into its proper detent positions.......it could be still bypassing a small volume of oil. As to "worn gears" being the source of noise AND ALSO being related to poor performance: Highly unlikely. The gears in this unit are the few that are required for just ONE reduction ratio between the drive motor and the differential section of the unit, and the differential gears themselves. The final reduction gearing would only be noisy during periods where the tractor ground speed was pretty fast and the pitch of the noise would change with any increase or decrease of ground speed. The differential gears themselves DO NOT have any relative motion to each other EXCEPT when executing corners (turning tractor to left or right) or when one wheel is spinning due to a loss of traction. At all other times the differential gears may as well be welded together as they remain stationary relative to each other. I suggest you might want to completely disassemble all the brake and friction pack parts for inspection, cleaning and lubing (where needed). Because Hydro Gear does list brake adjustment disorder as a possible cause of noise and poor performance, I am inclined to think that there may still be something about that friction pack and the brake caliper/pucks that may be at the root of the problem. If you put the trans into free wheel mode, are you able to roll the tractor at all by hand? If not....that may be confirmation of a dragging brake. If you undertake the disassembly of the brake and friction pack, be sure you take plenty of photos as you take it apart so you will know without question where each part came from and how it was oriented. Don't rely on the other manuals for that, they can sometimes be vague, but your own photos will be clear.

I don't leave the cuttings in the bleach solution for very long - a few seconds to a minute or so is adequate, I think. I believe that the anti-fungal effect comes from the dried residue of the sodium hypochlorite that remains on the cuttings. I don't want any of the solution to soak into the wood itself. Although I don't have any firm evidence, intimate contact with bleach can't be good for living plant cells! I set the dipped cuttings on paper towels to drip dry. Leon, whose methods I respect, after dipping and drying his cuttings, wraps them in saran wrap and stores them in the crisper section of the refrigerator at just above freezing or in a wine cooler that is just under 50 degrees F. It is very important not to freeze the cuttings! After treating the cuttings, I store my cuttings in zip-lock freezer bags in the vegetable bin of the refrigerator. Luckily, my wife Tina is tolerant of my fig germplasm hobby! Cuttings stored in this way will sometimes sprout after a year or more, although it is not advisable to hold them that long. Xon 2000: Some extra words of advice to your father-in-law regarding preserving the tomatoes. Be sure that none of the tomatoes you put in are spoiled. Put the tomatoes in the 9/1 bleach bath for about 1 minute, then drip dry as you would with the fig cuttings. Once they are well dried, place a layer of the tomatoes (none of the tomatoes should quite touch each other)in the bottom of a cardboard box. (Air circulation is important and a few holes in the box is good.) After putting down the first layer of tomatoes, place a sheet of newspaper over the tomatoes, then repeat the process until there are 4 or 5 layers of tomatoes in the box. Periodically check the tomatoes and remove any ripened or spoiled fruit. Keep the box in a cool location. My father in Alabama gathers a number of boxes of green tomatoes just before the first hard freeze and often has tomatoes into January. Interestingly, a Vietnamese friend of mine who is 83 years old tells me that his family used this method (bleach bath) many years ago in Vietnam to preserve tomatoes for storage and shipment. Sorry for the slighly off-topic comment, but the effectiveness of the technique for preserving tomatoes is additional evidence for its use on fig cuttings! Joe Hood

I am old enough to remember (a little) life before we were all immersed in color magazines, color internet, color TV. My guess is, people did feel more free to find their own way with color, with less worry about "doing it wrong." As a rough parallel, years ago, the physical appearance of political candidates was not as important as their words. (Abraham Lincoln really wasnâÂÂt much of a looker!) Now, how a candidate looks is as important (or more so) than who they are, because appearance can no longer be separated from the complete package. We can't learn about the candidate's opinions without also learning how they look. It's possible people feel pressure to choose "the right colors" because we never see anything in the absence of color, anymore; itâÂÂs predetermined as part of the complete package, and presented as a whole. We can't see finished rooms without also seeing the colors the designers chose, so maybe people start thinking Color Choice is another area best left to the professionals. So maybe all candidates must now be Pretty, and all rooms must now be Tasteful. That's fine, but we'll miss some remarkable opportunities that way, on both fronts. Maybe the earlier prevalence of black and white TV, photography, and books is why Frigidaire could sell appliances in pink, blue, yellow, and poppy red, years ago, but they canâÂÂt do so now? Possibly we gave ourselves more permission back then, to just buy what we happened to like, instead of worrying about resale or whether it might go out of style. I think it's also harder to commit to bold colors or strong styles because of the pace and volume of visual info on the internet. It's impossible to read all the blogs, all the websites, all the magazines, all the time, but it's easy to fall into thinking that you should, to do a Really Good Job. The pace of the available information might cause people to feel like they must always be ready to leap to the next mini-trend. (Which will be here in about fifteen minutes, and youâÂÂd better not miss it, or you might embarrass yourself by picking something that is no longer "current"!) Good grief. Maybe a lack of self confidence, for some of us, is part of the current lack of commitment to strong colors. If we all trusted ourselves a bit more, we could probably surf the ocean of incredibly rich resources we have today, pick what we like, and not be worried by the rest. (I love conversations like this.)

Well, Marianne, what you see is real enough, if not the entire reality. Thanks for the nice comments, all. The wisteria grows on a pergola in front of our house. It was one of the first projects DH carried out, when I looked at the barren, treeless, shadeless south-facing facade of our new home and thought about the summer to come. All the vegetation in the photos has arrived since and now we're nice and green, but we didn't start out that way. I love wisteria, too, think it's a most beautiful plant in every way, and it will be in every garden I ever create. It does require a laborious annual pruning and retying, done from a ladder while I get a crick in my neck, and taking a few days. It's worth it. Cathy K., yes, it is peaceful. Gardens aren't the highest good, but they express an aspect of the highest good. Going back to laundry: think how much happier the world's housekeepers would be if all clotheslines were located in beautiful spots. This is functionality!