In my estimation, the only case to be made for reusing container soils is one of economics, and you'll never find me argue against making that decision. If you can't afford, you can't afford it. That said and setting economics aside, you might decide to reuse soil for reasons other than economical. Perhaps the effort involved with acquiring (or making your own) soil is something you might not wish to go through or be bothered with. In any case, it would be difficult to show that soils in a more advanced state of structural collapse can somehow be preferred to a soil that can be counted on to maintain its structure for the entire growth cycle. So, if the economic aspect is set aside, at some point you must decide that "my used soil is good enough" and that you're willing to accept whatever the results of that decision are. All soils are not created equal. The soils I grow in are usually pine bark based & collapse structurally at a much slower rate that peat based soils, yet I usually choose to turn them into the garden or give them over to a compost pile where they serve a better purpose than as a container soil after a year of service. Some plantings (like woody materials and some perennials) do pretty well the second year in the same bark-based soil, and with careful watering, I'm usually able to get them through a third year w/o root issues. Watering habits are an extremely important part of container gardening. Well structured soils that drain well are much more forgiving and certainly favor success on the part of the more inexperienced gardeners. As soils age, water retention increases and growing becomes increasingly difficult. If your (anyone's) excellence in watering skills allows you to grow in an aging medium, or if your decision that "good enough" is good enough for you, then it's (your decision) is good enough for me, too. The phrases "it works for me" or "I've done it this way for years w/o problems" is often offered up as good reason to continue the status quo, but there's not much substance there. I'm being called away now, but I'll leave with something I offered in reply on a recent thread: "... First, plants really aren't particular about what soil is made of. As long as you're willing to stand over your plant & water every 10 minutes, you can grow most plants perfectly well in a bucket of marbles. Mix a little of the proper fertilizers in the water & you're good to go. The plant has all it needs - water, nutrients, air in the root zone, and something to hold it in place. So, if we can grow in marbles, how can a soil fail? Our growing skills fail us more often than our soils fail. We often lack the experience or knowledge to recognize the shortcomings of our soils and to adjust for them. The lower our experience/knowledge levels are, the more nearly perfect should be the soils we grow in, but this is a catch 22 situation because hidden in the inexperience is the inability to even recognize differences between good and bad soil(s). Container soils fail when their structure fails. When we select soils with components that break down quickly or that are so small they find their way into and clog macro-pores, we begin our growing attempts under a handicap. I see anecdotes about reusing soils, even recommendations to do it all over these forums. I don't argue with the practice, but I (very) rarely do it, even when growing flowery annuals, meant only for a single season. Soils don't break down at an even rate. If you assign a soil a life of two years and imagine that the soil goes from perfect to unusable in that time, it's likely it would be fine for the first year, lose about 25% of its suitability in the first half of the second year, and lose the other 75% in the last half of the second year. This is an approximation & is only meant to illustrate the exponential rate at which soils collapse. Soils that are suitable for only a growing season show a similar rate of decline, but at an accelerated rate. When a used soil is mixed with fresh soil after a growing season, the old soil particles are in or about to begin a period of accelerated decay. I choose to turn them into the garden or they find their way to a compost pile. Unless the reasons are economical, I find it difficult to imagine why anyone would add garden soils to container soils. It destroys aeration and usually causes soils to retain too much water for too long. Sand (unless approaching the size of BB's), has the same effect. I don't use compost in soils because of the negative effect on aeration/drainage. The small amount of micro-nutrients provided by compost can be more efficiently added, organically or inorganically, via other vehicles. To boil this all down, a container soil fails when the inverse relationship between aeration/drainage goes awry. When aeration is reduced, soggy soil is the result, and trouble is in the making." Al

Buyorsell, I always THOUGHT that about rocks cooking the roots! But everything I've read said to put it there. Sedum is a wonderful idea. I've got it growing everywhere else, why not at the base of clematis? I know that clematis like water and all, but I can promise you guys that I have some of them that have never gotten one drop of supplemental water - and around here it can get up to a 100 for 2 months in a row with no rain - and those clematis live and grow and bloom their fool heads off each year. That's one reason I love them.

Gol darn it! Got a whole post written and it's lost now. UHHh! Anyway, Thanks for the nice comments and suggestion eclectic: I love your vintage fridge! That kind of tile backsplash isn't for me, though. I'm WAY too much of a mess and really don't want big grout lines. Your kitchen is very charming, though. This thin brick is a big possibility, though! Mayflowers: I haven't heard back from the tile dude in a couple days so who knows. I do love that kind of tile... artistic with just enough whimsy to make me smile when I look at it. I think I could love it forever (however long THAT is, lol) I did mock it up without the tile... I'll have to look at it awhile to see which I like better. Maybe I don't need the tile after all. DH would be happier if he didn't have to set tile in the middle of a copper sheet, that's for sure... local: you're invited! Come in summer and we'll float or come in winter and show me how to cross country ski :) YA... I can't wait to see the floor installed, either. Piles of boxes just sitting there waiting....September or October for the flooring. November for the kitchen cabinets. Looking to move after Christmas and get our current house on the market and sold by early summer. Ok, getting ahead of myself a bit here... Seems the pale green behind the stove works the best to me, too. I hope the fireclay sample is a good color... EAM44: it is a great fit IF the color works. Gotta get a sample on the way tomorrow. I did an internet search for prices and couldn't even find it that way! 25.00 sq/ft isn't a deal breaker.. If I did a 6" BS around the whole L I'd need maybe 21 sq. feet. I can just hear DH now ... "what happened to the 3.00 a sq. ft white tile from Lowes?". Poor guy, he has a hard time keeping up with the changes :). Anyway, here is the tile or no-tile copper backsplash:

Hi all, glad to see the conversation is still rolling :) Some have directed questions at me, sorry for the unresponsiveness, I've been busy, I'll try to answer all. erasmus, I usually do keep leaves on the cuttings. I clip them to only about 3 or 2 leaflets and keep maybe 3 or 2 sets of them, the ones that are the top. I discard moldy or spotty leaves. Only for them to drop them all at about the one week mark. It doesn't really seem to matter much whether they have them or not in the end, but I do keep them, for what is worth. I also get rid of any new growth that appears, soon as I see it. I don't want them to direct the reserves of energy they have towards that, I want roots! >:^) When I put them directly on the soil cups, the leaves tend to stay longer, possibly because there's more humidity in the environment (the ziploc). As for light, I've been keeping them on the highest shelf in my kitchen, they don't get any natural light, but they are pretty much at the same level of the light bulb, it doesn't stay on all the time, just whenever you'd normally turn it on. In the past I've had a nice cutting of Cecile Brünner root splendidly in water sitting on a windowsill with plenty of indirect natural light, in the same kitchen. So, again, it doesn't seem to be a hugely important factor. And lastly, about hydration. I normally leave the cuttings that I take in water for a day or two, not out of any functionality that I perceive of it, but out of laziness or waiting to get a certain amount so that I don't get myself dirty to pot a single cutting, lol. If I'm not home, I've had them keep very well in a ziploc with a moistened paper towel for about 24hr. They do fine in the ziploc alone, in shade, for periods of less than 12hrs, though. Rosefolly, I don't measure the amount of bleach that I use. I use clorox in gel form, just a squirt and then fill with water, stir it, leave it a minute or two and then do several rinses until there's very little foam appearing when adding water. If there's some of that gunk already formed, the stream of water helps to wash it away, and after the chlorine wash it sort of turns to pieces, it looks like when paper breaks down in water. I make sure they are all gone before leaving the cutting be. It reforms in like a week; I've noticed it's much more prevalent when you use an opaque cup, so it seems it doesn't enjoy light. I haven't tried using peroxide, but I'm probably going to do so with the burrito method, per Claire's recommendation. Karen, babying a cutting shouldn't be so complicated, though the dedication you're giving them is of course admirable :) What I consider babying is just leaving the cutting in the ziploc in a not so lit not so obscure place inside, until the weather outside is right. I only have from October thru February. If it's still too hot, I open the ziploc a little and put them on a windowsill, so they get indirect sun, until it's planting season. Taking them out any earlier is a suicide mission. Interestingly, I've kept them in the ziplocs, closed, for a few months, even. I've had cuttings persevere in that tiny ecosystem for, believe it or not, 7 months! Of course it's not ideal, just some trivia, lol. Lastly, I've had several treacherous little cuttings make tiny leaves with no roots, even in succession after a previous set falls, like your case. I do hope you've got the real deal going on though! Sending good vibes! vaporvac, as of now I can only report I've moved most of the "water dwellers" to soil, many of them had not developed roots, though many had calloused. I did leave a miniature and an Archduke Charles whose nodes where bulging, pretty sure it'll make good callous. Since I had two cuttings of it, I potted one and left that one in water to see what it does, will report back. And Paul, thank you for stopping by, I'm a little starstruck because your blogs were my introduction to roses. I remember I somehow found a picture of Crépuscule somewhere, and was blown away; took note of the name and then went to google to stare at more, and one of the pictures led to the description of it on your site. I spent a few days going through the other entries after that. :^) I might try the Oasis foam some time. I've found that rooting within the same variety happens quicker in soil/peat than in water, but really I was just doing it this way because I didn't have the chance to get a bag of soil until recently. It's still a fun thing to do, even if not as efficient, sometimes you forget about them and when you check back they've done so much, it's somehow gratifying. It's also nice to know which ones I can put to do their own thing while I make time to go get soil; It's an alternative, even if a selective one, hehe.