The subject of soils can be enigmatic until you grasp one simple idea. Favorable air porosity is essential to good plant health is dependent on good root health. Soils made of predominantly small particles (peat, composted matter, coir, sand, topsoil .....) cannot offer the air porosity offered by soils made of predominantly larger particles. Imagine the air space between BBs in a jar and sand particles in the same jar to visualize. Along with small particle size comes increased water retention. Lots of water in the soil is easy on the grower, but hard on the plant. Plants like damp and hate wet/soggy. Plants don't drink water, they absorb it a molecule at a time from the vapor in the air between particles and from the colloidal surfaces (the surface of soil particles). You can use the ingredients in either the 5:1:1 mix or the gritty mix and make a soil that is either exceptional in it's ability to gain the favor of plants, or make one that is virtually unusable; so even if the ingredients were the same, how they are combined and the size of the particles holds more sway over the likelihood that grower and plant will find the soil favorable. As an example: 5:1:1 of appropriate bark:peat:perlite yields a very good soil. The same ratio, but with peat as the predominant fraction 5:1:1, peat:bark:perlite yields a soil as water retentive as most commercially prepared soils. Finally, I see a LOT of ingredients in the mix you mentioned that are there to hook you into believing that this soil is healthy because you're envisioning all that wonderful kelp/guano/f-meal/oyster shells providing a buffet for the plant that will ensure wonderful health. The fact is, those ingredients have no real value for houseplants that you can't get from a bottle or Miracle-Gro or Foliage-Pro with greater efficiency and surety the plants are getting what's needed, when needed. Essentially those ingredients provide an unnecessary source of nutrients at the expense of aeration - so I look at them as far more likely to be a limiting factor than a plus. If you keep your focus on providing a soil with excellent drainage and long term aeration (all about particle size and durability of the particles) such that your soil holds minimal amounts (or no) perched water, you can't go far wrong. Remember that for container plants, providing good nutrition is a fertilizer thing, and not a soil thing. As far as practical experience with any one soil, the ingredient list can be very telling (as others noted with tongue in cheek), and you don't need to be the bus driver to know the wheels go 'round & 'round. ;-) Al

I pulled this offline. I would leave it alone and advise DO NOT water it, its been watered more than plenty for a newly planted yucca, let the soil dry completely before watering again. I would even consider moving the rocks around it for a while in order to dry out the soil since you have had a lot of rain. The rocks will help in winter when you really want the crown to stay dry and clear of leaf debris or anything that stays wet. If rain continues, if it was me, I'd move it under cover until the weather settles to prevent rot and allow it to dry out. From what you wrote, it sounds like the plant has plenty of roots already so its not a cutting that needs more time to develop them. The roots are geared and prepared for storage-- the plant stores moisture as a coping mechanism against periods draught which occur in its habitat. Being dry for a period wont hurt it, constant wet will. If dry, the leaves would appear shriveled, dehydrated and stiff, not drooping and it would take some time for the plant to finally succumb to dying due to too dry. This particular type is more tolerant of moisture as it would need to be in shade with supplemental irrigation in a place like west Texas.

Sheri, I wouldn't till in the pine needles. They are great on the surface of the soil, but they do not break down quickly in the soil so they will tie up your nitrogen for a long, long time. Till in the rabbit pellets. They are terrific. About the old tomato plants.....in general, it is best to avoid tilling them into the soil. Why? Because any bacterial, viral or systemic diseases they may have had can live in/on the old plants and infect the soil. That can cause major disease problems. However, research has shown that if you compost the plants in a hot pile (a hot pile is one that heats up enough to kill the pathogens in the compost ingredients) and then add them to the soil, the tomato plants grow exceptionally well in soil with the composted tomato plants. So, I always remove my garden debris in the fall, compost it and then add it back to the soil. I don't till it directly in though. If you have already tilled in the plants before you read this, don't panic. As long as you mulch the plants really well, you probably won't have a problem. Anything that may have been present in the plants will reside in the soil, but it generally would infect the plants (if at all) only through soil splash, and not through the roots. So, a heavy layer of mulch will reduce the chance of soil splash. And, how long have you had your plants from Keith? Did they have any sign of damping off or sickliness when they arrived? Have you been keeping them too damp, 'cause that will do it, you know. How big are they? I would have thought he would send plants large enough to be past the damping off stage? (sigh) If you happen to have any chamomile tea, you could mist the plants and soil with it to see if it helps. I think it is more of a preventive measure, though, than a cure. I hope you have a lovely day in the garden. I was out in my garden at 6:45 a.m. and it was 47 degrees, but this should have been our last really cold night, if you believe the 10-day forecast. If you have any more questions, post them and I'll check back every 2 or 3 hours during the day. (Whenever I come in for a short break.) Dawn

I am in Southern California, South of Los Angeles. We do not get much rain here, and it tends to be sunny most of the time, and summers tend to be very hot. It does tend to be a rather dry climate here, but we are not too far away from the coast, so at least the humidity does not go too low. I can't stand going further inland, I can feel the dehydrating dryness in the air and it is not comfortable. Actually we have had a past couple of days of rain, unusual for summer, and it has been unusually humid. Actually things are looking fairly lush and green in our yard, and the front yards in the neighborhood do not look too bad either. It might be because of the recent rain. It is not always this way, usually things start becoming less green in the summer here, since it is a dry Mediterranean climate and seasonal. So especially put in context, it does not feel like a bad year at all. I do frequently water several particular plants every 2 days, but we have cut back on the sprinklers, and that is what takes up most of the water, since it just sprays water all over the place and is not very selective. The yard is not too huge either. I think perhaps because I water so frequently and consistently, the plants do not need a lot of water. That may sound paradoxical to some, but it really is true. If you do not water very frequently, it takes more water to saturate the soil enough so that the plants will not dry out many days later. And because I water selectively, and only get the plants that need it, not the grass or bushes. I have also been intentionally planting things to try to create a moisture microclimate, and I think that is starting to pay off too. So a combination of several factors. I have recently gotten into gardening, and I do not think I would be able to stand having water restrictions if it started affecting the yard in any way, but fortunately that is not the case. I will also have you all know that I hate those drought tolerant plants that are being promoted. I am trying to turn the yard into a lush temperate rainforest, even though I do not live in the climate for that. I planted a redwood, and special ordered authentic varieties of ferns. Yes, we do have two tree ferns, but I made sure to plant them in locations that do not get full sun, because I know tree ferns often tend to turn brown in this climate. They are planted in just a little partial shade, and seem to be doing okay. I try to give the foliage a quick spray every time I am out there with the hose, to keep them from drying out. We do have a rose geranium bush growing in the front where it gets very hot and dry. This bush is very prolific and vigorously spreads even though it does not get much water, and the soil beneath it is terrible hard clay. The bush grows 3-4 feet high, and seems to thrive where most other plants would bake in the sun and wither, it has spread to 10 feet wide. We did not originally plant it either. It was growing in planters, and wherever those planters were set on the ground, even hard dry clay soil, the roots made their way out of the little drainage holes in the bottom of the planter and established themselves into the ground, propagating a new plant. These things can get a little invasive in your yard if left unattended for a long time. So it is possible to have a lush yard in a fairly hot dry climate that does not use too much water, without making compromises. At least that is the way it seems for our yard right now. Just throwing an optimistic report into this thread, I know many others are struggling.