Love the photos! We've been enjoying the sweet lettuce this cold weather has brought, too. But my potatoes froze . . . again. I think they might give up this time. Maybe your cukes are waiting for it to stop frosting at night?

First the disclaimer. Horses are a touchy subject because there are so many people with different levels of experience, and different methods, and feelings get hurt easy. Anyway. Horses learn to be bad very easy. They also learn to be good, but need a good person to teach them. Horses that come from a trainer can be good, and then when with their owners who don't know as much, they start to be bad. Horses are always being taught something, everyday, but it is difficult to realize what you (ourselves) are teaching them. Horses are herd animals and want to be with their buddies more than anything. Even if they fight. As to the fighting, separating them before they sort things out is not generally a good idea. Eventually, one of the horses will give in and say "uncle" and then they won't fight so much. Of course, in the couple minutes to an hour that may take, one of the horses could get seriously wounded, but that is the risk you take. Sometimes, there are reasons to keep fighting, like everyday the food shows up and the weaker one doesn't get out of the way fast enough. Having a pen that is too small is a problem, because the weaker one needs to get out of the way. So if you keep having problems, I bet your pen is too small. And when you feed, you need to grab the boss first and tie him until he's not so hungry and cranky. Also, you need to feed hay in two locations about 20 feet apart. A horse that bites doesn't know that the person is the boss. There are different ways to show a horse who is boss (and this is where horse people really fight with each other). My suggestion is an everyday approach, keeping in mind that every day horses are learning from you, good or bad. Your interaction must require him to submit to you. He can't point is butt to you, he can't feed without you telling him it is ok. He can't walk in your space. And he certainly can't bite you. If he is doing those bad things, then don't feed him that moment, don't let him stand still that moment. Work him by moving him out from you. In a round pen, you would work him around and around. You on ground, you with whip, you motioning for him to get moving. But be very quick to recognize good behavior and instantly reward it. In a round pen, the reward is letting him stop, letting him come nicely to you. If not working in a round pen, if not using a whip to move him, at least get a hold of him and not let him eat until he stands nice for you. Then say "ok" and let him eat. Every day. Every darn day. Take this approach to everything you do with the horse. If the horse is being bad, don't tolerate it. Is the goal to ride the horse or is it to have a good horse? If the horse is being bad while saddling, address that. Don't just skip over that part to get to the riding. Also, look for things that might be pinching him, because it might be your fault if the saddle doesn't fit. In my view, hitting a horse is a waste of time. Not saying you are hitting, but just wanted to say. Instead, you have to outlast him. Go slow, and praise the good behavior. When bad behavior happens, do it again, do it again, do it again, when good behavior happens praise him. Do what again and again? Do whatever it is that is causing the bad behavior. Take saddle off and put it back on, take saddle off and put it back on, when he doesn't bite then praise him and go onto the next step. Get the picture of the tediousness of the battle day in and day out? That's what I mean by outlasting. The mistake, in my mind, is when people say "oh, forget it, let's just get onto the next step". That's when the horse wins and gets away with it. By the way, there are no bad horses. Just bad teachers. Every person who interacts with the horse is a teacher. You, your husband, your kids, you are all teachers. What are you teaching the horse every day?

For the propagated roses, make chicken wire cylinders for winter to protect them from hungry rabbits. Then do some research into expected rainfall for your area. Yes, the urge is there to do moves in good weather. But the roses do better if you wait until your rainy season is just about to start. Here, I've got ten years of records and I know that we get a spurt of rain at mid September and then it gets dry (yet again) until towards the end of October. So, mid October I start watching weather patterns and I might dig a few holes. But rain in quantity is my determinant. For long term averages I first search the almanac page at weatherunderground. Enter your zipcode and you'll find today's weather. Scroll down on the left and you'll see records and almanac. Good stuff there. Here is a link that might be useful: Weather underground portal

This is a most unfortunate situation and the reason why one has to be cautious about willows. From the sounds of it, now that you've removed the tree, the outlying (detached) root system is sending off shoots to take over a new tree. The removal of the main tree had been a mistake. Ideally, you;d chop it down to a stump and apply round-up heavily and let the poison travel down it's root system and this will kill eventuall kill off the entire tree. Now in trying eradicate the roots, how have you been digging them up? Cutting them where you find them? This leads to more new plants developing where you've cut off the roots. I cannot think of any ways to go about it but to see if you can find each and every shoot, apply Round Up heavily and let the toxin travel through it's root system. When there is evidence that the shoots are dying, then dig the root system out and be careful not to cut them and accidentally create more plants. Sadly this may cause you to dig up your lawn. As for plants growing through the deck, if you can find a way to crawl beneath and install a weed cloth to cut off it's access to sunlight and water, that would kill off any new growth.