I was thrilled to track down the artists for the blue balls - called "Skyball" and ask my question about what keeps people from rolling them down the hills. Here is what he said: Hi Laura, Your perception has been shared by untold numbers of high schoolers who've left broken and bent pry bars attempting just what your imagination suggests. In fact, there is a huge concrete caisson going ten feet into the ground below each "ball" which has a heavy steel tube that connects to a cast in structure in the bottom half and continues up to the top where it indexes into a hole at the very top. Each sphere weighs about ten thousand pounds. They might as well try to roll a house down the hill. Thanks for your interest, Steve Gillman

Well, you could read the posts under the thread title "Miracle-Gro Tomato Plant Food 18-18-21" to get a feel for the lengths that orchid growers will go to to get the perfect flower. Ignore the Urea free nonsense that you find there. I do not subscribe to all organic. I subscribe to lots of organic on the garden plus some other stuff now and then. For your purpose just use some fish emulsion and seaweed extract as per directions on the packet/container. Your orchids will get nutrition provided by the bacteria and fungi as they break down the mix and make Nitrogen and other stuff available to the orchids. It will be interesting to see if anyone has used a 100% organic method on orchids and what sort of results they got.

Pleiones, Habeneria, Calanthe, Pterostylus, Calopogans and a few other US native terrestrials are doing fine. The ones from China, Cephalathera, Orchis (Chususa), Oreorchis, Amitostigma, Peristylus, Neothianthe, Herminium, Gymnadenia all did uniformly bad. I still have a few of them but they are lingering, barely alive. Last year I got a few from Europe, alpine terrestrials they call them, 50% success rate only. Biggest success story is the Cypripedium experience. After getting the hang of them, I'm doing well with them. I posted a number of them on the 'Gallery forum'. Nick

Lilyfinch, mine was 60!!!! Of course, that's just dreaming and many are OoStock. I'm limiting myself to 10 and half of those at least are presents. I'm so happy DH suggested that for Xmas! : ) I'm like you; my interest in clothes has gone to ZERO since growing roses. I see everything in terms of how many roses does that equal! I'm getting some others that are only available fomr RVR and the few that are sold out at ARE, I plan to buy from Burling, such as Excellenz von Schubert, Green Ice and Sweet Chariot. From RVR, I'm getting E.B. LeGrice (on Moses' recommendation), Orfeo, Golden Buddha and another that I forget! Too many roses. It took me all season just to remember those I added to the pack this year. I worked all yesterday on the split rail and only have a couple more holes to fill and posts to set before I can add the deer netting on top. Then I defy any deer to come on my property.