Frank, I got it from the same ultimate source, Dave Wilson Nursery. I got it through Bay Laurel Nursery, one of the other nurseries selling DW trees online. I owe another installment on the fruits. Wickson - this little apple has been excellent. It needs to hang until the background turns yellow. It keeps a long time. The taste is more like a stone fruit: sweet/sour like a plum and the aroma of peaches and apricots. Yum!! Myers Royal Limbertwig - A very nice apple on the sweet side with good aroma as well. It has the pendulant branch habit of many limbertwigs. Rambour d'Hiver - a large French apple which is pretty obscure these days. It is actually not that different from many American apples, e.g. Stayman Winesap comes to mind. Not a strong aromatic favor but a very good sweet/sour balance plus an exceptionally good crunch. Gold Rush - not too many apples this year but they are all excellent - hard, flavorful, with this unusual anise/spicy flavor. A truly great gourmet apple. The quality of the fruit has been very good. The tree did well except it gets cedar apple rust - not sure why this tree touted for such disease resitance is a CAR magnet. Most of my White Winter Pearmain dropped to early, I think the tree lacked water (it sits on a raised area). But, a couple hung on and they are really excellent apples -- something like a Mutsu but quite a bit more concentrated in aromatic flavors. My Geneva 3 hardy kiwis are coming in now, tons of 'em. They are ripening unevenly which makes harvest difficult. I don't like them until they have started to shrivel, they are too acidic before then. Fully ripened they are very good, a bit better than a good Hayward. I had a big harvest of quince and made various compotes, jelllies, etc. I don't know how big a fan I am of them, it takes a lot of quince to make jelly and I feel like I am just flavoring sugar. My wife made a baked quince recipe which was very good. If nothing else the quince will be handy as pectin for other jellies and jams. Scott

Re: "The only plants with soil are the lotus & lilies & there's no holes in the bottom of the pots. The others are in gravel with landscaping fabric lining the holes in bottom of pot." When I rebuilt my pond this year I repotted all my aquatic plants by removing and washing off all the soil and then planting them into peagravel (in baskets). Some of the plants I put directly into a section of peagravel in the pond (no baskets). Its been 3 months now, and everything is so slow... very little growth. I was starting to think that maybe this wasn't such a good idea. With the fish chomping away on the roots of the floaters, and then the lilies and mariginals hardly growing and providing very little coverage, I'm also battling with water thats too warm and lots of algae. (Geez... I wish the fish would eat all that algae and leave the roots alone!!) Anyways, I was starting to think this was a bad idea, when I talk to the guy at the pond shop/nursery who told me that putting the plants in peagravel is the new way of thinking and is actually much better in the long run as the plants are truly hydroponic. He said I might not get much leaf and flower growth this year, but the roots are getting established and are getting used to taking the nutrients from the water instead of soil. (I can see the roots have grown alot when I lift up the baskets). Next year and the future years, I should have good growth, and the plants will be strong with much larger blooms than if I had left them in soil. So perhaps it just takes some time and patience... its definetely frustrating. I rebuilt my pond this spring and I can't wait for it to look more filled in (even just a bit more..)... sometimes is embarrassing when people see the new pond and all I have are piddly plants and lots of algae....

I have about 6 or 7 flats started and mostly doing well. I have 28 tomato plants just put into separate pots (3 varieties: Black Krim, Iidi and Padova). Also, there are 3 flats of coleus, one flat with cuttings from last year's favourites and the other 2 with new seedlings. I'm trying for ones with a lot of yellow in the leaves but not having much luck. But I do have one rather small and weak one with almost completely black leaves. Probably the colour is why it's not growing very fast (not enough chlorophyl),but it seems healthy. I also have lots of baby primulas of 3 kinds. Two sets are in the cold frame as they are from last year, and the others are auriculas from this year. I got the seeds from France and had quite poor germination so I'm watching the plants I did get really closely. For unusuals, I have seedlings of things I collected in parks and nurseries locally. They didn't care if I collected seeds, so I went wild! Now I have red yuccas, pineapple lilies, phormiums, pearly whites (a local wildflower) and eryngium agavafolium.I also have 3 different kinds of penstemons, but while growing, they're very slow and tiny. Let's hope at least some of them survive!

Those daisies are asters also known as a montauk Rose. The lower lights are florescent and give off heat, they heat the rootstock and help start the process of soil drying, and keeping the soil close to room temperature. My readings say I am usually within 2 degress of 72 to 74 air temp. they are timed to come on one hour before before the upper cool LED lights come on. Although I'm about to construct a Steve Bucket Light or two....I have 3 babies that are really meant to go outside permanently