Some people wax their scions- it used to worry me that the wax would get in the way of the graft healing, but apparently not. Drying is bad!. But easy to prevent- the damp (not too wet, just damp) paper towel and zip locks do a fine job. And you can tell: it will be obvious when you pull a scion whether there's any dessication. If you have plenty of nice, long shoots I suggest you start slicin' and splicin'. Just take a shoot and practice on it. You'll find sticking points (what taper is good, getting a clean, straight, flat cut, fighting with bark that peels off oh, so delicately) but if you do a dozen or so practice grafts you'll start to feel like you're getting a handle on it. Keep things clean and don't let anything dry out. Make your cuts as cleanly and as clean as possible (and try to avoid whittling, but you'll do some) and don't let the cut parts sit around while you fumble- air not only dries, it oxidizes. It's OK to prepare one half of the graft and tuck it in your cheek. Slip the pieces together gently and and wrap snuggly but not crushingly. It's more like hugging a small child than bear-hugging a junior varsity football player. If you use parafilm I suggest a snug but careful wrap with a soft rubber band to hold things in place, followed by parafilm. It's impossible to wrap parafilm too tightly as it'll pull apart first. But it's probably not strong enough to guarantee contact, so the rubber band provides the mechanical strength while the parafilm backs that up and seals the air out. Both degrade in sunlight, which means cleanup is limited or nonexistent. Get the cambia aligned. The trick here is to NOT aim for perfect, parallel alignment, but to very slightly cant the scion off just a bit. The tip of the scion will be just barely too far into the wood of the rootstock, and the tip of the rootstock will be just barely too far into the air, (or vice-versa)and a very good section in between will be the active cambia in pretty fair contact with each other. Keep posting- we expect to hear success stories in just a few weeks. :-)M

One trick for tying up excess nitrogen in over fed situations is to add some sugar as the carbon will allow the bacteria to consume soluble nitrogen and store it as their own biomass. The other method is to leach the pots out a bit. I think once you remove all the old foliage you are probably safe but you could add a spoon of sugar to soil when you water.

Four stars for Bobbie, three for TM, and two for Nancy and Annette. Well done all. 1. Spike Mulligan was an Irish comedian as I said above. 2. Bette Davis "she did it the hard way" certainly seems to fit. 3. DeeDee Ramone has "Okay...I gotta go now" which is an old Kinks song 4. Sinatra has "The Best Is Yet to Come". See link to song above. 5. Of course, Churchill. 6. Ludolph was so proud of working out pi to 35 decimal places (worked much of his life on that) that he wanted it on his stone. He was a German-born mathematician and fencing teacher who lived in the Netherlands. 7. Belushi -"But, noooo" is one of his famous lines. Wonder if Aykroyd came up with that for him. 8. Rodney Dangerfield. 9. Joan Hackett apparently hung that sign on her door when she didn't want to be bothered. I already told you that, didn't I? Mel Blanc voiced so many of our favorite cartoon characters and of course, that was the sign off for all those Looney Tunes. Hank Williams. Could not find the story behind that epitaph, but will keep looking. Thanks for playing everyone. Have a terrific week. Spring has finally arrived here and I hope the same is true where each of you is! Cynthia

Happy Spring! Today as the snow melted, the iris reticulata poked through... And the first crocuses survived the snow I am late with starting seeds. I have snapdragons, violas, calandulas and poppies going so far. More to go.