Hi Carol: I read your posts 3-times, since you gave very valuable info. Many thanks! You are right that no conclusion can be made as to own-root or grafted is healthier, it depends which one has a bigger root compared to the mass above. The ratio of top growth versus root growth is what determine health. Someone grew 2 Love Potion floribunda, one grafted, and one own-root. The own-root got BS due to wimpy root, the grafted one is healthier. In contrast, Jude the Obscure as Grafted-on-Dr. Huey became a 7 foot monster in its 3rd year, with black spots late fall, despite their spraying every 10 days at the rose park. Three people reported own-root Jude the Obscure as very healthy, 3' x 3' as in my zone 5a, to 4' x 4' warmer. When the mass above is too big for the root to support, diseases can occur. Grafted roses can be healthy if pruned right, or if they don't face a harsh winter like my zone 5a. I dug up many Knock-outs, most lost their Dr. Huey if buried deep in wet clay. One in a dry spot had only Dr. Huey. One in a perfect spot had both Dr. Huey and own-root together, but Dr. Huey's root is many times bigger than the own-root that grew above. It's LOSE-LOSE for roses grafted on Dr. Huey in my zone 5a. If I plant them at ground level, they die, then Dr. Huey takes over. If I plant the bud-union 4 to 6" below ground level, Dr. Huey disintegrate, leaving a wimpy own-root. See below picture of Yves Piaget x Bohemia Rhapsody by breeder Robert Neil Rippetoe in CA. It's a 6-months old rose that I grow from the seeds that he sent. It's 100% thornless, dark green, and twice bigger than all the bands I bought. As to soil test, Carol, I wrote the procedure to test your soil pH using 50 cents of red cabbage and $1 of distilled water. It's more accurate than litmus paper. Even the $200 pH meter needs re-calibration, that's why I wrote the procedure below for English Roses Forum: Here is a link that might be useful: Cheapest way to test soil pH using red cabbage This post was edited by Strawberryhill on Tue, May 28, 13 at 13:06

I agree with several others here that Geo Seeds may be the best source of flower seeds. Excellent selection and good prices. Yes, the catalog is simple and the seed packages do not have growing info, but that's OK if you are experienced. This past summer was one of the hottest in SW NH. The weather did affect some of the annuals, but we still have a very good year for cut flowers. We grow a lot and even if some varities fail we have enough back up. One problem we've been having is with tall Marigolds (Crackerjack, Lemon Mum, Jubilee). Normally they grow very well for us, but the past 2 years they have failed. We rotate crops, but even that didn't help. The annual Asters were not up to snuff, either, but the Snaps (Rocket, Madame Butterfly, Tall Deluxe, Brazilian Carnival, Snappy, Chantilly) did well, even with the hot weather. Rudbeckia Cherokee Sunset is always a winner, Blue Horizon Ageratum also. Anise Hyssop provided us with non-stop blue spikes of fragrant flowers. We grew Cramer's Amazon for the first time and it was HUGE with nice spikes of red flowers. Alas it didn't start blooming until mid-Sept. and by then the market was ready to close. I'll grow it again but in the border. We've tried a wide variety of sunflowers and have always had good success. This year we grew Golden Cheer, a large double sunflower. It was fantastic and sold out at the Farmer's Market. It was very productive and gave us bloom from mid-to-late summer. A definaite winner! We may concentrate more on the doubles (Giant Sungold, included). They hold up better and last longer. Scabiosa (Blue Cockade & Imperial) seemed to be affected by the heat but produced enough. The Zinnias (Benarys, Burpeeanna, Cactus, State Fair) seemed to take awhile to get going but once they did we had more than enough for our bouquets.

Zone--6B Name of Plant--Heliopsis helianthoides 'Prairie Sun' Year it was bought--2006 Where/Size--White Flower Farm/Bought 2 Quart-sized pots Irrigation--Seldom Site Conditions Optimal--Yes (Full sun all day) Pest Problems--None Disease Problem--None Comments--It gets more magnificent each year. Both plants grow 4/5'wide by 6' tall, have dark purple stems and bright yellow daisy-like blossoms with a red eye. It's a long-bloomer from June until fall. Five thumbs Up

Hi all, new to the forum. :) Hubby and I are gardening in Wheat Ridge. 2013's good, bad, and just plain weird... Yellow Cherry went steroidal on us, breaking down the biggest tomato cage we had. It had so many fruits on just one plant that I made tomato juice out of self-defense (it was delicious, btw). Golden Jubilee was a big disappointment. It ripened one fruit, which I never tasted because my visiting six-year-old niece was so enthralled with it that I gave it to her. The plant unfortunately never produced any more, but I'm hoping it was a good investment in the next generation of gardeners. Siletz had what I ended up calling "Teenage Mutant Ninja Tomatoes". It producedvery well, but the fruits were the weirdest thing I've ever seen. Almost all of them had what looked like stubby fingers growing from inside the fruit out through the blossom end. We later heard that there was a seed lot that had this strange mutation - evidently our packet was from that lot. (I had thought it was maybe our proximity to Rocky Flats!) They tasted fine, but were very weird-looking! Burgundy okra was a definite winner. I grew it out front in a rose bed we'd built that we didn't have the budget to plant entirely in roses. The okra flowers were pretty and occasioned lots of questions from neighbors who didn't know what it was, and we got enough okra pods to freeze a few bags. We haven't used it all up yet. Sugar Snap peas (the pole type) - another big winner. Nice fat, sweet pods and lots of them. We froze a bunch of these and are still enjoying them. Giant Marconi peppers - our first successful year with these. They really were giant! Good producer, too. Brassicas in general did rather poorly for us this year. Spring broccoli didn't produce till October, only one head of cabbage survived, and the cauliflower died the moment it was set out. Hard to tell with the potatoes. They got caught in that September deluge as we were starting to dry down the vines, and almost every spud split because of the sudden excessive moisture. They taste good, but look awful. That was our 2013...