Ahhhh, the lazy part - been there, do that too! Dance With Me - I've heard it is hard so I never got it. Earth Angel - grows like a weed, love it. Ice Age Trail - I had it, got it as a young TC and grew it in a pot but it didn't survive this spring. I've seen pics of IAT purchased from Jim's Hosta that were big and gorgeous. It also is a streaker plant and will produce other streaked plants from seed. If you get it, save me some seeds. Touch of Class - gorgeous, don't have it but have one of the look alikes named Dream Weaver. It does very well here and intro'd by Kevin Walleck, our current AHS prez. Jewel of the Nile - another KW intro and it grows like a weed here. Paradigm - a classic, yes to it. Liberty - a new one for me last fall. It almost didn't come back and when it did was puny. I dug it up and potted it - the leaf is 1" and probably won't make it back next year. I replaced it, it has only produced one new leaf - I hope it comes back next spring. Liberty is a sport, probably tetraploid of Sagae. I highly recommend Sagae for the look, the margin just isn't as wide. I don't have any of the others and have heard nothing about them. For a balanced hosta garden, make sure you bring in solid colors to offset the patterned cultivars. I didn't because I love all the same type. I then had to go back and bring in some solids and to move things around to please the eye. It is the same as the daylily addiction - we bring in our favorite colors, look around and it becomes blah, so we then bring in other colors to liven things up. Some good blues in different sizes I recommend - Abiqua Drinking Gouard or Love Pat - great color, upright growing. Small blues that hold their color late into the season - Blue Jay and Fragrant Blue. Dark greens - Fried Green Tomatoes, a couple of Lakeside plants that I can't remember right now. If you want big, try some of the sports from Sum and Substance - Sum It Up, Bottom Line and Sum of All. Big, fast growing, all with edges but not "clashy" edges. They are all dark green. Other must haves - June, Paul's Glory or St. Paul. I know you don't like the skinny leaves but consider Ginsu Knife, has a slight light margin but lots of rippling on the edge, Marilyn Monroe, lighter green with ripples and Queen of the Seas, big blue with ripples. These offset the big round leaves that I love. For golds, Choo Choo Train, Sweet Sunshine, I think, hybridized by Solberg and a couple more Lakesides I can't remember, really make the shady areas pop. Have fun as another addiction starts. Could I also interest you in orchids?????????? Brooke

I always wear gloves, breathing mask, and optionally long pants and sleeves when working with questionable vines or plants. Sometimes I even do it with disposable gloves. The herbicide should give you a general time frame in which it would be rain-safe, but you should also be prepared that there might be some unexpected plant casualties even if you are very careful. Some people did stick the vine end into a small cup or container with Roundup. I think poison ivy would absorb it in a similar way if you did that. That way, you can reduce the amount of plants that will get exposed to the herbicide.

If the termites are less than a foot away from the house then I'd be especially worried -- in my experience at least, the soil up to a foot from the house is injected with termiticide to form a chemical barrier. So if they're that close, there's no effective barrier. Even if they're further away, then this is a wake-up call to get a barrier treatment, if you have no record of a recent treatment. Definition of "recent" depends on the kind of chemical, so get a few pest control operator opinions on that. Incidentally, once the barrier is in place, you'll need spot retreatment if the soil is disturbed in specified ways (e.g. if a plumber digs it up to fix an underground pipe). As for bait systems... My pest control guy is as honest as the day is long, and he doesn't believe in baits. He treated a house that had severe termite damage (e.g. you could poke a screwdriver through one of the interior walls) despite having a monitored bait system for years. Here's an anti-Sentricon web page: http://www.syix.com/emu/html/sentricon.html Personally I wouldn't sleep well if my house was protected only by baits.

Thanks floral! I guess I just called it a seedling because it's a young plant early in the spring :-/ There's no spines on it, and for the most part still looks exactly the same, e.g., it's not getting taller - yet. Maybe it'll bloom later this summer; if so, I'll update a picture to help identification.