I think Dr. Byrne, a Texas AgriLife Research rose breeder according to the article, is developing some new roses that he hopes will be beautiful and healthy as well as take the heat. The articles says he produces, plants and evaluates about 20,000 rose seeds every year. It's just nice to know that a few people are trying to develop good roses for hot climates. Until then we'll just have to keep each other apprised on what's working well in our hot gardens as well as watching to see what "Earth Kind" rose tests reveal. One of the problems with my area of Texas is that it stays so hot at night (the low 90s) as well as having triple digit summer temperatures in the daytime.

Hot diggety dang, I'm still logged in. Whatever it was that whoever did, it worked. Life may now resume its normal course. Dorothy, they were alive when fall hit so now we just hope they make it through our winter. It's been a mild one so far. Jay, the garden did for crap this year. It was just so soggy for the first half and then dry as a bone for the second half. No one I've talked to had anything other than a completely cruddy year up here. 2012 will be better! Nice to talk to you all again! Diane

How does your aerator work? What kind of equipment is it? Please desribe your equipment, size, pump type, injector?, retention size, equipment sequence...etc. It is not clear by what you say: "The results showed that I likely do not need a water softner." How was that concluded? I was wondering how much flux would it take to prevent water from entering the aerator? Sounds a little strange to me. Maybe it prevented air from entering the water. If your aerator is creating ferric, or precipitated iron, then a softener after it will have no (or little) positive effect. In fact, it will probably damage the resins and perhaps the valve over time. The iron will come through and cause staining and other problems. You need an efficient backwashing (mulitmedia) filter. Andy

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