Dee, I have purchased from Bluestone, but I also do a lot of local buying as well. I am not an impulse buyer, I will plan on buying at peak sale times, like 50% off trees and shrubs in the fall at the good nurseries locally. I start perennials from seed with winter sowing like you do. I have bought a lot of plants inexpensively at local private sales, like the Three Sisters Sale in May. I have picked up perennials for $3/4. each, a good size cutting of a Viburnum maresii for $9., Hellebores for $7. There are a lot of those type of sales in the spring if you keep your eye out. I won't be looking for a replacement for Bluestone for awhile. I rarely make purchases in the summer months. But there is one that I'm aware of that I've almost ordered from but haven't yet. Sandy Mush Herbs, was a company I read about in an article in one of the larger gardening magazines. They don't exactly offer 3 packs, but they do offer small sizes for good prices. For instance, they have Buxus for $6. each. They don't offer a full line of shrubs, but they have some interesting offerings. You might want to check the Gardener's Watchdog to see what people's experiences have been. As for why Bluestone is only offering plants for Spring of 2012, that is odd. I assume they don't ship plants in the hot months, but I would think they would be shipping again in the Fall. Maybe it has to do with their changing over to the new pots. Terrene, I was thinking that too, that the smaller pots are more difficult to keep watered. Here is a link that might be useful: Sandy Mush Herbs

Some Fonts (Text) can be made larger but if you don't like it, change it back. Right click your empty Desktop - properties - Settings - on your lower right - Advance - Change the DPI Settings from 96 to 120 - for popup click OK - for another popup click Yes Click Apply or OK as needed. This can be changed back the same way. It will mention that your computer needs to be restarted but mine makes the change without restarting. Not sure if needed. cg

Firefox has a Zoom toolbar add-on. On your Address line, just to the left, you will have a refresh icon and 3 magnifier icons (larger, smaller and even smaller) plus an X which will stop loading the page. Just a click and you get it. I use them a lot. Sue

I live in the plains of Colorado. We have tons of robins and some other birds. They disrupted all seedling activity last year. They got through every barrier and uprooted both transplants and seeds. I'm guessing it is because we have worms and no one else does! The neighbors put out food when Winter ends, ugh. That probably just attracts them to my big bed of worms! My question might be better in a forum about soil, not worms. I sent the soil test because of trouble with seedlings, with crusting, and with our tomato plants growing huge last year, but making very little fruit. Just tons and tons of plant. It will be good to know our nutrient availability and the composition of the soil. I am wondering if I could have too many worms! I took some out in the Fall and built bins for them. There are so many! My garden bed looks like what I hope my bins will look one day. Worms when I remove the top crust and this coffee grind look just beneath the soil and all the way down to the clay about 14 inches below. I don't have a good (untreated) source for brown material. My own garden plants have had too much powdery mildew and too many bugs to turn back into the soil. So, I just seem to have worm poo and robin holes out there to grow in. Maybe that's a good thing... This year, I'm growing for the pollinators, but I hope to address a few little issues before next season when I'll be putting out more veggies.