Al and Nathan, I hope that you don't mind my sharing a humorous story about Turface, that really highlights your points and underscores how respected a product Turface is in the industry. My son is a Turf Grass Agronomy major at a large Southern university, and did an internship last spring/summer at one of the major league baseball spring training facilities in Florida. Turface is used for excess water on the fields that occurs during rainstorms, especially those "popcorn" showers (downpours) that occur frequently in Florida. It has helped prevent many a game "rainout" due to its effectiveness. It takes many bags of Turface to do this (for one game), which can become a bit pricey---so it's a protected commodity in the baseball industry. During one sudden torrential downpour, the Grounds Crew quickly pulled the tarp over the infield, and then took cover in the visiting team's dugout to wait out the storm. The Turface bags were kept to the side in the visiting dugout, near where the Grounds workers were standing. The visiting team's pitcher had a bad inning just prior to the rainstorm, and came into the dugout kicking and throwing things, as they sometimes do. As he looked for things to use to vent his frustration, he eyed the bags of Turface to the side, and the Grounds workers caught his glance, and could tell that he was tempted to kick them, also. They immediately, in *unison*, said "don't even think about it!". Throw your glove, knock over some bats, kick the bubblegum containers over, but don't mess with the Turface...unless you want to take on the Grounds Crew... :)

Hairmetal: I think we talked about your problem with those plants before. I don't know why you had a problem with them. But, as I said before, I don't normally have to water any of my plants in 5-1-1 more than once every other day. This goes for six-foot tall tomatoes in 25-gallon smart pots resting on the ground as well as flowering annuals in 16-inch hanging baskets lined with coco fiber. If it rains at least an inch, they can go three or four days without more water. If you make the 5-1-1 properly and you use a container that is big enough for the root system, you will not have a problem. 5-1-1 holds a lot of water. The ground doesn't suck it all out of the pot.

If you have floating junk...just overfill and float it off the top. I started with a 35 gallon preform and in a lot of ways it can be tougher than a larger container. Try some small water changes. About 10% a day or dip out about 1 gallon and replace it with fresh water. I started a 500 gallon lily tank this spring with growing plants. It also has 10 small goldies from last summers spawn. It has no pump or filtration. It is clearer right now than my 750 gallon tank with the large fish, pump and large skippy type filter.

Actually, they were given to me in exchange for some advise to help someone to fix up their pond. So, it was local. You should be able to find a dwarf tropical on line. All I could offer you are seeds to a dwarf tropical that if you sprouted them this year, you wouldn't get blooms till next year. Do a search for night blooming water lilies and find one that you like. Then check to see if it is on eBay. It might be cheaper.