Since it's doing so well, I would keep my fingers crossed and just feed and water it. Sue

Before I went to bed last night I found some lengthy conversations about Pump-n-Seal and FoodSaver on a website called "Chowhound". There were several threads, all of which I read, and this is one. Some of the others are listed if you scroll down on that site. http://chowhound.chow.com/topics/650398 The gist of what was said on this forum was that some people got FoodSavers that really didn't last very long. Apparently you need to read the instructions carefully and do all the do's and not do any of the don'ts. Some people, on that forum and also on the Amazon.com reviews, had a lot of trouble getting the FS jar-sealing attachments to seal jars. Some people were getting the jar-sealing attachments confused with the "universal lids", which are two similar but totally different things -- mostly because the universal lids are meant to stay on the container, in place of any other kind of lid, and the jar-sealing attachments are meant to seal down a canning flat and then be removed and used to seal another..and another.. and so on. That's what had me confused for awhile. Some people were finding that the jars they used had to be new and of a certain shape and not have any little imperfections where the jar sealer attachment seats onto because if it can't seal itself onto the jar, temporarily, it can't vacuum out the jar. And of course your jar rim and lid have to be clean, and the lid has to be in good shape, though you can re-use the lids as long as you are careful each time you open the jar to release the pressure. Some people found it worked better if they pushed down on the jar sealer while it was in operation. Apparently some folks had a lot of trouble with the PnS when it came to sucking the air out of a zip-lock bag. You've got to be really good at it in order to pull the tube out of the bag and then finish the zipping process without losing the vacuum in the bag. And of course there's the issue of the ziplock bag not being high quality enough bag material to hold the vacuum once it's been sealed. Lots of people tried the Zip-lock pump (they have new bags out now with a suction baffle on them that might lend themselves better for use with the PnS). But everybody said the Zip-lock pump was a piece of junk. So it looks to me like, if a person ever thought they'd need to use the part that sucks the air out of bags, they probably should go with the FoodSaver. Most people said they didn't like how they had to waste 2 or 3 inches of the bag on both ends because the bag sensor that triggers the heat sealer is that far from the heat sealing strip. But other than that, most of them had found other ways to solve the problem of how expensive the bags are (catching them on sale, washing and reusing bags if they didn't contain meats, and buying off-brands) Ken said, on one of his posts on Harvest, that he had a separate heat-sealer that he always sealed the bottoms of his bags with, and at least saved the 2-3 inches there. If I ever get a FS, I guess I could use the Pak'n Save that I have now for that. You have to use the heavier-weight bag material because if you try to seal a regular ziplock bag on it, the bag will melt all over the sealing strip and can ruin it. But people said they resealed potato chip and cereal bags from the store with the FS, without using the vacuum part, without problems. According to the chart that is on the PnS site, the one I linked in the previous post, the PnS, at 28.9 inches HG and the FoodSaver, at 24.2 inches HG are the only two with the ability to pull sufficient pressure. My Pak'n Save was next on the list at only 2.5 inches HG. Of course there is the chance of sucking up liquids and ruining your equipment, or preventing the seal from working. Same with powdery stuff like flour. One person solved the powdery stuff problem by putting it in a bag inside the jar. This kept the powder in the jar better while still being able to remove the air, both from the inside of the jar AND the bag inside the jar. Someone else said the instructions with the machine suggest you freeze liquids and foods that have liquids that leak from them, like meats, before you vacuum seal. One guy said he freezes soup, vacuum seals it in bags, and mails it to his kids. By the time the soup gets there it's thawed and ready to eat. I sure wouldn't recommend this. Good way to knock off your kids, though, if that's what you're interested in. Heh. There was also some discussion of the vacuum crushing things like potato chips and cookies and some people said that they vacuum sealed potato chips and listened to the chips snapping under the pressure for several hours after. Might be a great home-school science project. There's a You-Tube of a marshmallow that was pressure sealed in a jar that people say is quite entertaining. I haven't seen it but I imagine the marshmallow expands like it does in the microwave. If you think about it, there are some things that you buy at the store that are packed with air in the bag. Such as chips and cookies. On the PnS site, they had a reprint of an article done by the Chicago Tribune back in 2006. Of course it being on the PnS site, one would not know if they had edited it in places to make it sound more favorable to their product. So I went to the website of the Chicago Tribune and paid $3 for their archived article and the two versions were the same. The author of the article said they "fell in love" with the PnS, but then according to them, the FoodSaver did what it was supposed to do, too. Now, this is not definitive proof, because I've met newspaper reporters and they are not.... like, experts or anything. But the article did say that the seal was still good after "more than a couple of weeks" in the jars that they sealed. An added advantage of the PnS over the FS is that the PnS is small enough you can just put it in a drawer when you're done using it. The FS takes up a little counter space. Something that is a scarce commodity in my kitchen. And PnS is hand-operated so no noise and no electricity needed. They say it's quicker, too, and good for when you're away from home, like camping,etc. You can use it to repressure pop bottles so the contents won't go flat, they say. Hmmmmmmm. Maybe both these places should send me an advertising fee or something. What I'm thinking, for the time being, is that I might go ahead and spend the $30 and get one of those Pump-n-Seal contraptions. They said on Chowhound that the bowl covers Pump-n-Seal sells are not worth the money, but I was just planning on ordering the basic package and not the more expensive one that includes a couple of bowl covers, anyway. Once I have it, then I might look it over and see if the tube of it looks like it would fit into the FoodSaver jar-sealing attachments. If so, then I could just order the jar-sealing attachments and use them with the PnS. Maybe those little pieces of tape would hold the vacuum in just fine, I don't know, but I would want to test that out before I did anything large scale. It would be easy enough to know you've lost pressure when the canning flat falls off the jar, right? Heh. Who knows, maybe I will happen upon a FoodSaver at a garage sale or estate sale this summer. Or maybe now that I'm registered on the FoodSaver website, they will send me an e-mail that tells me they're running a 24-hour half-price sale, as they did for Ken, when he was still posting on the Harvest forum. OK, so Dawn, did you get the jar sealer attachments with the FoodSaver that you got for Christmas?

A bit of hosta lore with respect to this forum; My mother the late Pauline Banyai was trying hard back in the late 1950's to build up our home garden soil, which was quite sandy loam with a clay layer about 1-2 ft underneath (southeast Michigan typical soil). Not good for perennials! Living in the city, we were fortunate to have an undeveloped lot next door which my mother knew the owner of. She convinced the city of Madison Heights to dump their leaves gathered in the Fall on that lot - it was many dump truck loads, leaving a pile about 5-7 ft tall as the leaves were not compacted. Her 4 boys and the neighborhood kids proceeded to tromp the leaves down, leaving a 2-3 ft playing field over the winter. The next Spring the heavy winter snow had helped it drop another 1-2 ft as it composted down, while us kids continued to play on it. That summer my father began hand tilling that composted leaves into the garden, which took him a couple of years to complete. Then they started it all over again. Those who visited Mom's garden always wondered how the soil was so rich and soft; just work composted leaves in for a couple of years! Peter Ruh pushed that concept further and build his new hosta beds in compost piles which he built for purpose. I moved to Delaware and built my hosta beds in mushroom soil, which was dreamland! Bruce

Wow, what do you do with all those peppers? I've been very into chili powders these days... going to start experimenting with different blends... So far just making a blend out of pumpkin habaneros and peruvian yellow peppers, I highly recommend it for next year if you don't have them now.