Could you please indicate what brand is advertising like classic snake oil salesmen? Our local garden centers don't carry bagged compost with advertisements. Just a title with a big word that says compost and instructions for mixing. One real example is "New Plant Life" brand out of LaPorte, IN. The only claim they make on the bag is that they make no claims. It's in a little box in the middle. I have some right outside, so I checked. Otherwise, though, the majority of the compost carried is in bulk. As for claims about being the best thing since sliced bread, well I think everyone here has seen that nearly every commercial blend of fertilizer makes those claims and are even now jumping on the "organic" bandwagon and making new claims to appease those against synthetics. Need me to list those brands or are you familiar with what I'm talking about? What a company has to gain in regard to not classing a compost as fertilizer is not a matter of opinion. It's a fact that when a long time customer realizes that they can provide a better food source and stops buying the fertilizer company's product, the fertilizer company just lost money. Compound that by the thousands of gardeners in this country that have the means to make compost and learn to do it properly. Then you are talking about bigger losses. Then consider the fact that those people's children are being taught to not buy the synthetics and you are talking about an entire generation not buying their products. And further, these companies obviously don't share your opinion but rather have decided to look at the facts considering they have realized they have to market to composters and now are producing "compost starters" and such gimmicks that many new composters are picking up like crazy not realizing that what these companies aren't sharing is that these microbes are easily found in a handful of dirt. One last thing and I will stop polluting this thread with so much writing. Since some here are concerned about government claims, I encourage you to check out what the EPA has to say about the content of nutrients in compost. Essentially it only proves our government agencies and associations they rely on tend to only contradict themselves. http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/non-hw/composting/benefits.htm

Jo, any time you catch and release a critter, you can pretty well plan on it coming back. It's fine to be a humanitarian about it, just as long as you know that's what they're going to do. I think that some of them can beat you back to the property, and dumping them where they'll be a problem for someone else is not a very good plan either. I hate to have to shoot things, but there are times when it's really the only thing to do. Dawn, I know what you mean abut every day being an adventure. When I went out to check the tomatoes earlier, I found a small turtle that was feasting on a small fruit I had tossed aside. Not a terrapin. An actual turtle. I just left him alone. One of the more exciting things that happened is that I have a big bank of windows in front of my computer and around to the side, so I get a really good view of most of the pasture. One day during the heavy snow, in the middle of the afternoon, I saw something swoop down and grab a small prey and then fly up to the top of one of the sheds. I figured it was a hawk. Naturally, I got out the big binocs, because I wanted a closer look. Imagine my amazement when he turned his head and looked at me and I realized it was not a hawk at all. It was a huge owl, out hunting in mid-day! As far as those black snakes, we tried the artificial eggs, and I tried jamming the holes full of bird netting, and we shot a bunch of them. I was horrified to learn that they can kill a full-grown hen. My neighbor who raises chickens as a business is the one who told me what the problem was, after I had him come and look at a dead bird. What seemed to finally cut the population way down was when I put out that Snake Stopper powder. I've only done it once, and probably need to renew it pretty soon, but we haven't found a snake in the chickenhouse since then. Not that they can't come in and steal eggs and leave again. I just haven't seen any of them this summer. I scattered the powder when I figured snake season was about to begin, as soon as it really warmed up, and it seems to be working.. Pat

Niivek: "I think everyone on this forum would agree that worm castings make a good fertilizer." This isn't meant to be nitpicking, but we sometimes can give people wrong ideas about some of the qualities of this wonderful soil amendment that we coax from our wormies using ultra-healthy dietary parameters that we don't even think about adhering to our own selves. Vermicompost is not a real high quality FERTILIZER. It's a wonderful soil amendment that will cause those soils to become so fertile that they don't NEED additional fertilizer properties. It's also a seeker-out of all those nasty diseases and fungal infections and waste-laying critters that are partly enabled by all the chemicals that're used by chemo-heads (like way too many people on my street) who're used to putting a chemical product upon a poorly performing garden/lawn problem for INSTANT gratification. When used properly and consistently....and exclusively, vermicompost and AVCT will eliminate the need for any of those things. Anyway, peeps expecting INSTANT gratification with VC.... like they are accustomed to with chemo....ain't gonna get it, and when newbies don't, they give it up way too soon sometimes. It takes a little while for a newby vermicomposter to get his mind right and forget about putting some chemical (designed by the corporate entity to aid that problem but also laying waste to ALL the bacteria causing the little problem plus all the good guys too) on a particular little problem on the lawn. That strategy assures corporate chemo a loyal, steady-returning client base that'll keep coming back for something to help repair the destruction the previous chemo caused. But outstanding fertilizer VC is not. Chuckiebtoo FWIW: I've posted lots of pics of before/after, and proof-positive results of VC and AVCT applications here in the past. A little search can erase a lot of doubts as to the viability of VC....and especially AVCT (which has been taking some poo-poo hits lately around here). That happens occasionally when climate-change-denial types rear up espousing doubt and speculation with iittle or no knowledge of the actual facts.

Oh Goodie!! Today's the big day!!! This week in our local paper they were featuring pizzelles.....now I know. They can be waffle-like cones filled with cream. Yum. Sitting in anticipation of receiving a gift in the mail! LOL Have fun Lou, and Good luck to everyone, and kudos to the lucky recipient.