Touch of Nature has a very good price for the red Lycoris radiata. (They are listed as one of GardenWatchDog's 30 top companies). I plan to order some, to establish in another part of the garden. Some of my red ones are just starting to bloom, some have finished, as have the white ones. The yellow-flowered ones are a"no-show" so far. Another member of the Amaryllis Family are also starting to bloom. The Oxblood Lily (Rhodophiala bifida). They have some foliage present when they bloom. Other fall flowers I am still waiting to see, are the Crocus and Sternbergia. Cyclamen hederifolium started blooming about 2 weeks ago. Rb Here is a link that might be useful: Touch of Nature - Lycoris

I contacted ts about some of these same issues and more. I was also told about starting the blower a few minutes before running the water. Turn the turbine OFF during the filling of the tub and turn it back on when you're ready to get in. I haven't tried it either. I understand about the bubble bath additive being an insulator. The other night when I added bubble bath and the entire bathroom was cover floor to ceiling in bubbles (ok, a slight exaggeration :) ) it dampened the noise of the air jets so I'm guessing it could insulate the water temp too. Kinda like a cloud cover on a cold winter night. The earth stays warmer than on a clear night. I'm afraid I won't be maintaining the ambient room temp in the winter and in the summer keeping the water hot enough won't be a problem for (hot natured) me. In the winter, I like to keep the house about 66-68. In fact, to withstand how hot I get in the tub, I have the bathroom ceiling fan on. I've been not filling the tub as much as I would normally and letting hot water trickle. This is working. Our turbine is installed in a linen closet in front of the tub. It's about 2.5 feet from the tub. DH put pipe insulation around ALL the piping around the tub and leading into the turbine. minnt, do you know about the *secret* menu? I was told about this when I called to ask about the air jet intensity. I felt very little difference between 5% and 100% :o And felt like something was wrong with the turbine. If you will press the uppper left menu button and hold for about 20-25 seconds, a new menu will appear. This gives you many more options. This is not in the owner's manual. Among other things it offers a lower intensity air jet setting. The same 5% to 100% but with more noticeable changes. For instance, the 5% is just a gentle roll. It also lets you invert the heated backrest. I don't see anything about turning off the control panel light. There is ab option in the menu that isn't self explanatory. I haven't had time to explore them all. Under "Drying Cycle" you have four options. Prog & Auto, None, Program, Automatic. I just set mine to none to see if it doesn't come on after 10 minutes....it did not :o I know it needs to but I'd like to be able to have it come on maybe 20 or 30 minutes later. I do the hydromassage first and then bathe. I don't like the race to finish bathing and get out of the tub before I'm blasted out! (lol) Ah ha! Reading the manual helps! To prolong the bathing session and delay the automatic drying cycle by an additional 10 mins, press the upper left button twice (when the drying icon is visable). This action may be repeated to further delay the drying cycle :) Easy enough! See Drying Cycle (Programmable) in the owner's manual if you want the drying cycle to come on at the same time every day IN ADDITION TO coming on after a hydromassage session. Hope this helps :) Monica

"I have noticed little clumps of webs. Not spun from leaf to leaf but more like set up as little houses on the under sides of the leaves. I have noticed that one of the plants the leaves feel very dry, not dead, just dry, and have yellowish patches on them. Is this spider mites? There are some little holes on the leaves as well." Sounds like classic spider mite sign. If you can see the webbing, you have a large amount of spider mites, and they are moving to the next plant! Take the plant AWAY from any other plant, and treat those plants as if they are infected even if you didn't see any visible sign. This is the organic way- Clip off the branches with the webbing, toss in a sealed bag into your trash. Wash each remaining leaf and stem by hand with a bit of soap and lots of water. I'd pour slightly soapy water into the pot, too, for good measure. Keep quarantined from other plants, and I'd spray leaves with soapy water every other day for a week, then every few days for another week. Or you can use neem oil instead, but it has a rather offensive odor inside. Good luck!

Oh whew...I am so relieved to read that nobody thinks they are spider mite webs. Whew, whew!! Is there some definitive way to determine mite webs vs spider webs? Thanks TJ. You are right. And I haven't sprayed a thing, good or bad, in the last 15 years with the mentality of "come what may" but this yard has been trying. I have never seen so many good and bad bugs in my life...and in the last month resorted to BT to kill the hornworms that are decimating my tomatoes and since I'm spraying anyway, I bought the neem which I'd read up on here. It appeared to be pretty innocuous overall, so that I used along one fence where most of my succulents live in light shade and dappled sun--that's the area where both of these photos were taken. None of it was sprayed on my edible or flowering plants, as I read that neem can damage blossoms... The only thing I have consistently used except when I lived in SF was snail bait and they seem to be having quite the blast anyway this year. Jean, we sure do! I can't confirm my neighbor ID'd what she saw correctly but upon hearing that and about two minutes before I ordered neem, lol, I did google it and Japanese Beetles were spotted in the Sacramento area, right above me, per the CA Dept of Ag. I only read one article but that was close enough for me! Ken, my spiders are year round, I'm afraid. January has much less than the other months but there is no month where I can't find spiders crawling on my plants or webbing here and there. Come spring, there's virtually no plant I can't find a spider on or at least evidence of some spider having been on it. That said, I still find it really bizarre that at this yard, for the first time ever in my gardening life, I have not seen ONE aphid. Spiders are not predators of aphids, are they? I've never seen a ladybug here either..probably because there are no aphids. Not complaining but I find it so bizarre! Thanks again, folks!