Anney, I only grow (1) lima & (1) runner bean in my main plot; but I try to grow 2-3 rows, in different locations. Both of these are tall, free flowering, and more attractive to bees than common beans... so they make great barrier crops. I use pole yardlongs as barriers too, but they are less effective, since the blossoms close early in the day. Multiple rows can enable a variety to be a barrier for itself. Provided that I have enough seed, I grow a row of limas on the outside of the garden (facing my neighbors), with a second row of the same variety close to the center. If the bees are very active, the center row is more likely to "cross" with the outside row than with anything grown by my neighbors. As Fusion mentioned, cucurbits (such as squash, melons, & cucumbers) make great barrier crops. I grow a lot of bitter melon, which is a vigorous climber. When grown on a trellis, it forms a dense flowering barrier as tall as the pole beans (fragrant too, when in bloom). Trellised cukes or Tromboncino squash work well too. Instead of placing all cukes & bitter melon in one large planting, I divide them up into 2-3 smaller plantings, scattered throughout the garden. I do the same thing with okra, dividing it into several rows at different locations. For flowers, I use cleome, a flowering mallow (Malva sylvestris "Zebrina"), sunflowers, cosmos, and basil. These are also dispersed throughout the garden. I can't speak highly enough of the "Zebrina" mallow; it flowers heavily & continuously, and is a really great pollen source. I've seen 6-7 different species of bees at the same time on a single plant, and large plantings will attract honeybees. It volunteers heavily, but to me that is a good thing... I choose my weeds carefully. ;-) It has now displaced the 2 wild mallows that were native to my area. When all of these barriers are combined (which takes a bit of planning), the effect is to create a maze that controls and/or restricts the movement of pollinators, and provides numerous places for them to "wipe their feet" as they cross the garden.

I thought I would post an update to my situation... after having thermostat things replaced, things were working better but still not normally. Now I would say we are back to square one. I can't depend on the oven to keep temp. I couldn't dream of getting it to do 450 degrees and stay there. The holidays are coming and I'll plan our cooking around it. People have posted here considering purchasing Big Chill and I would never recommend buying BIg Chill. Their customer service is terrible, nearly non-existent. Something is very wrong with their engineering (Bluestar) since a gas oven isn't exactly rocket science. The cheap tin can GE range that the Big Chill replaced worked a million times better. In our previous house we installed a Viking dual fuel. It was solid as a rock, never had an issue with it. Why did we buy Big Chill? If I'm being honest, it was because they look great. Beautiful colors, great styling. I did a little research but come on, would anyone expect all these troubles from a gas oven range? We are considering buying an induction range. It would be really easy to buy a Big Chill Induction in French Blue to replace our lemon. But I won't be taking that chance. This time around I will maybe have to forego the looks for something that works. I just don't want to take another gamble on Big Chill.

From the KP manual The Turbo Boil burner (18k BTU) is the most powerful burner for cooking in larger pots, for canning, for large amounts of soup, or for boiling water, and it is located at the right front of the cooktop. • The Simmer burner (5k BTU) is best suited for simmering delicate sauces, and so on, and it is located at the right back of the cooktop. • The Power burner (12k BTU) is recommended for bringing large quantities of liquid to temperature and when preparing larger quantities of food, and it is located at the left front of the cooktop. • One standard burner (7.5k BTU) may be used for most surface cooking needs, being designed to fit most cookware. It is located at the left back of the cooktop. • The Simmer Oval burner is located in the center of the cooktop and consists of a center burner (the 5k BTU Oval Simmer burner) and an oval burner, consisting of two, 12k burners. The center, Oval Simmer, burner can be set separately from the overall Simmer Oval burner. This is badly written bc it makes you think the center consists of 5+12+12 but does this actually mean the center is 5+12 = 17? If so, total of 59. If not, and center is 12, then 54. I am looking at all gas too.

The CFM per BTU/hr rule of thumb comes from commercial (and fairly standardized) cooking appliances vs. their (fairly standardized) overhead hoods.* Neither the cooking zones or the hoods are a particularly good match to their residential counterparts. A better rule of thumb, in my view, and more aligned with the action of the hood, is to ensure that the velocity of the air/effluent that reaches the hood baffles is high enough to ensure that there is no smoke reflection from metal parts back into the room. I recommend a velocity of 90 ft/min. Because we don't have a way to shut off parts of the hood that the effluent doesn't reach when only certain burners are operating, this velocity has to be achieved over the entire hood aperture. Hence, the hood requires an actual flow rate of 90 CFM per square foot of aperture, independent of the number of burners that are operating. (This is for maximum cooking surface temperatures (smoke point of peanut oil, for example, when wokking) and for gas burners. With induction, there is no combustion hot gas entrained in the cooking plume and its velocity is a bit less. At lower temperatures, the flow rate can be lower because the rising effluent velocity will be lower. However, at low air speeds through the baffles, there will be less grease collection by centrifugal impingement. I successfully use about 90 ft/min over my induction cooktop and nearby induction wok hob with an island hood. Your plumage may vary.) Our hood blowers use a fan blade design that only supplies the flow rate listed for the fan at zero static pressure across the blower; i.e., with the blower hanging in free air. When mounted in a hood, or in a duct, or on a roof, the blower sees restrictions. These include the baffles (or mesh filters), the pressure losses from turbulence -- both at transitions and from the duct walls -- and from similar such losses in the make-up air (MUA) path. There is always MUA. How much you get vs. how much you need determines what the actual flow rate of the hood will be due to pressure losses across the blower. So whether or not a municipality requires a deliberate MUA system, or the cook opens a window, there has to be good flow into the kitchen to make up for the flow out of the hood. Else there won't be much flow out of the hood. Even with reasonable MUA, there is enough pressure loss in the loop from cooktop to outside and back to cooktop to significantly degrade the rated blower CFM. I recommend choosing a blower that is rated at about 1.5 times the calculated required CFM from the 90 CFM/sq. ft. rule. There are also safety aspects of adequate MUA that may apply. Hood overlap is important to minimize the grease that escapes the hood and condenses on the rest of the room. In a wall application where there are side cabinets, the air flow toward the hood helps direct the rising effluent toward the hood, so the hood's effective capture aperture may be a bit larger than the physical aperture, particularly if there are no drafts that displace the smoke away from the hood. Mounting the hood out from the wall can also help, but the filler plate at the back should be angled to aid reflecting the effluent toward the aperture rather than down. kas ----- *For a description of both methods of CFM requirements estimation (from a commercial point of view), as well as images of smoke capture and containment vs. smoke capture and failed containment, see Greenheck's "Kitchen Ventilation Systems Application and Design Guide" (KVSApplDesign_catalog.pdf) available from their website. http://www.greenheck.com/media/pdf/otherinfo/KVSApplDesign_catalog.pdf MUA is also addressed in this paper. Note that all Greenheck CFM requirement values are actual flow rates, not blower CFM rating rates, and that balanced air pressure MUA is present in the commercial kitchen.