Our club has a greenhouse with natural light where we will plant tomatoes in sixpack cells the 7th of March. The cells are on heat mats at 70 degrees. Three weeks later on March 28 they will be transplanted into 5 inch pots, still in the greenhouse, but off the heat mats. Three and a half weeks later they will be sold. We sell 1500 to 1800 per year, with around 50 varieties. I hope our experience may be some help to you. Each cell is sown with two seeds, the excess is snipped off at soil level. We seldom have any vacant cells. As a non profit we get old seeds donated, which work very well. Al

Hi, Not sure if I am too late or not. However, I have organo, sage and various mints: Lemon balm (lots) peppermint balm of gilead (tons) grapefruit mint I'm interested in your irises. PLMK. Thanks.

Well, I have never found this plant to be particularly difficult to control, overly agressive, or problematic. As I stated above in my posts, I have no real trouble controlling it by harvesting and eating the tubers. Blanket statements about what should and shouldn't be "banned" here, there, and everywhere really bother me. Some plants truly are invasive and problematic in many regions, but things should be evaluated on a case by case basis. And, if we took the attitude that anything non-native shouldn't be grown because it might potentially be invasive, North America problably wouldn't be able to feed itself, and our ornamental flora would be greatly limited. What really bothers me, though, is being told what I can and can't do in my own garden by others. The Michigan legislature, in its infinite wisdom, debated a bill a few years ago, in 2005 I believe, which would have made "possession," defined as having a plant growing upon one's land, whether or not it was there by intent of the landowner, of a whole number of "invasive" species punishable by fines of up to $250,000 and up to 5 years in prison. The fact that the vast majority of these plants, things like purple loosestrife, yellow flag iris, and Japanese knotweed, were already rampant in Michigan didn't seem to register with the geniuses in Lansing, most of whom wouldn't know an invase plant it it bit them on the (well, you know where!). A group of professional growers and amateur gardeners got together and were able to get this horrendous and stupid bill defeated. Had it been passed, as written, it would have turned hundreds of thousands of Michigan landowners into felons overnight. Endangered and threatened native plants should be preserved, but banning plants from gardens isn't the way to go about it -- time would be better spent cleaning, improving, and protecting the specific habitat of threatened natives and learning to grow them in cultivation to preserve the species.

I attended high school in the 1950s and our school did not have a lunch room. The students brought a bag lunch from home and ate in the bleachers in the gym. My typical lunch was a sandwich, a fruit, and a pastry. We high school kids carried our lunch in paper bags. If I was careful with my bag, it could be folded after use and slipped inot my back pocket to be used again. I usually got 3 days of use out or one bag. My one room country grade school lunch experience was different. I carried a lunch box with themos. The thermos liner never lasted an entire school year before it was broken. Most of the time it broke when dropped of when I fell during my journey between home and school. One time it was broken when I used my steel lunch box as a weapon to defend my self from the school bully. Times were difficult for my family during my grade school days. My sandwiches were made with cuts of cooked, home cured pork on slices of home-made bread, I remember once when we ran low on luncheon material, I had a bean sandwich. This was navy beans between two slices of bread, one slice was buttered with home made butter. During those times, once I had a raw turnip to munch on. In the fall, I'd grab an apple or two from a tree in our small orchard on my way to school.