Sharon, And I've no doubt that she would carry it off with great style, but you see only the picture - to be in the presence of them is something else. Christopher, Say it isn't so, Christopher, that you've been spending so much time at the Orchid Forum that you don't recognize your good ol' Crassula ovata, and it's going to plank in the pot, as it were. It was a plant which I removed all the leaves and the rootball, because it didn't fit into the thrift-store bonsai pot (made in Japan!) which I wanted to grow it in. Le Upright (y) is Tylecodon (definitely) paniculata (? - likely, per Tom, and the leaves will be big, well, big for Tylecodons). Paul, They're impervious to the shoes' powers - I just wish they were the same way with the cats.

I think the first question is going to be - what are you hoping to use it for? I ask because some mixes are pretty much 'sterile' already, and perform just fine. However, even though many people apply the term 'sterile' to planting mediums, it should be noted - just for accuracy's sake - that it's almost impossible to sterilize soil without extremely harsh chemicals, or equipment not available to the average person. The closest that the average person can come is sanitization, and to keep it that way is next to impossible. Many products used to create mixes are - barring contamination - pretty much 'sterile'. Vermiculite and perlite are examples. Another issue that your post addresses is this issue of mycorrhizae. Now, it's true that some plants can form symbiotic relationships of this type, and there's no doubt that fungi (as well as other soil life forms) do play an integral role in the cycles that affect plant growth in nature, but these relationships are not necessary at all. This is why I asked about what will be your use of the potting soil. If it's for container plants, don't sweat the issue. There's a lot of hype surrounding mycorrhizae because it's one of those new products for which companies are trying to establish a market. Plants have been growing in containers for millennia. No special products necessary. This isn't to say that some things help more than others, it's to say that spores are EVERYWHERE! Wait... you just breathed in a thousand of them lol. If you want to grow a tropical plant, for example, then odds are that any mycorrhizae that have a relationship with that plant will only thrive in the tropics. The products that are sold as mycorrhizae only contain a few species, and doubtfully those for tropical plants. So... 'sterilization' of soil is really only important for those people who don't want to introduce bugs or diseases. And if you haven't experienced these problems, it's not really an issue. If you are running a commercial operation, and you want a good reputation, then finding a 'sterile' (sanitized) mix may be more important to you.

I don't think so. Even if all is well at The Treatment Plant, there is so much that water can be exposed to between there and your kitchen sink. Especially if your home, or the water lines that deliver the water TO your home, are older than just a few years. We cannot afford to depend upon the EPA to protect us from water contamination, or anything else for that matter. There are so many contaminants in our water that they don't consider to be unsafe. But, here in America, Land of the Free and Home of the Brave, shouldn't we have the right to choose? If you do much reading about things that are done "for the public good", you will soon run into many who consider the addition of fluoride into our water supply as a bad thing. Here is a link to some interesting information about that, presented at Dallas City Hall by Dr. Paul Connett in 2014: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xguPD85-BH4 Not to mention how difficult it is to find toothpaste or mouthwash that doesn't contain fluoride. Not to mention that fluoride is not the only intentional contaminant in our tap water. There's chlorine added to kill bacteria. When we water our garden from our home's water hydrant, we are contaminating our soil and therefore our plants, with whatever's in that water. We are also discouraged from disposing of any of our pharmaceuticals by flushing them because it has been found that some of these drugs do not process out. It is folly to trust that NOBODY is flushing drugs. Seriously, there is a large population in America that either doesn't know, doesn't believe, or doesn't care. Even if you have a septic tank, where do you think the septic tank truck goes when it's full? For a long time, we felt safe drinking water that was filtered. And then, we found out that there are not many filters that can remove anything beyond particulates. So many of us started buying bottled water. Now, we are hearing that certain elements of the plastic that the bottles are made of are getting into the water that's in the bottle. Not to mention that our landfills are now littered with them. Also, not to mention, that what's shown on the bottle label as "spring water" is now said to actually just be tap water from some other place, we know not where. When we lived in town, I bought a water distiller. This was because the small town in which we lived was in the habit of flushing the lines every now and then. We'd do a load of wash and find our white clothing washing in rusty-looking water. We'd fill a glass with water at the tap and it would be brown, sometimes with stuff in it that would settle to the bottom of the glass. And I still use the distiller, now that we live in the country. When the distiller is finished, I find about a tablespoon of dark brown liquid in the bottom, and it stinks. And there's a coating of lime on the whole inside, where the water boiled as the steam fed into the evaporator coils. I've read that the only way contaminants can be dependably removed from water is via steam evaporation or by reverse osmosis. Even this is not a perfect situation. It takes time to do. But at least I'm not lugging home case after case of bottled water. There's the cost of the distiller, but it pays for itself eventually if it replaces bottled water. There are some who say that, once it's distilled or "osmosed", the water is "dead": devoid of any of the trace minerals that we need to have in our water. So what are we to do? Why, we buy Trace Minerals, and we put 20 bitty drops of it in each gallon. Can we trust the efficacy of these Trace Minerals? I don't know. It seems like everybody lies to us now. And it is sold to us in a plastic bottle. *Sigh*.

We've had so many issues with local compost from the Township that I refuse to use it. We're not talking sensitive plants, I could understand that. We're talking about this stuff killing established trees and things like zinnias and lilacs. Not that I think it's heavy metal contamination by any stretch of the imagination, that's going to be an issue of slow, patient buildup over decades most of the time (although most city soils would test poorly for lead simply due to gasoline standards through most of the 20th century, but that's another story...and really less of a problem than one might think). But it's a very wise idea to know one's compost source thoroughly. Ours is too hot, frequently contains uncomposted sources of ag-grade herbicides, and most of us refuse to use it any longer. I make my own in a bin hidden behind a bush. Metals do leach out over time as well, but...well, they leach out somewhere, now don't they? :-) But they've always done that, and for most compost and amounts reasonably used, that's not going to be a huge issue either. I do a lot of the soil test reads over on the lawn forum (really, I'm happy to do them for anybody who asks, but read Logan tests almost exclusively as I do this free and don't have the time or inclination to learn every test on the planet), and frequently am asked about fireplace ash. I tend to give the stuff a fairly hard "no," as in, if you want to apply it at 10 pounds per thousand square feet once per year, I guess I'm OK with that if you have absolutely no other option. One, pH. Two, lye. Three...heavy metal concentrations from the wood. Which is no joke as those roots go deep and wide and tap water that may not been disturbed for ages, but has had the leachates from groundwater for centuries... Don't get me started on what people do just on their soil. I joke about eating my cadmium and cobalt paint, but I really do treat the stuff like it's slightly hazardous and never, never pour rinse water down the drain and never put out more than I know I'll need. That's helped by the fact that the stuff costs a fortune for the good stuff anyway.