I am a new member of this forum. I have really enjoyed looking at the terrariums linked on these pages. The info regarding certain harder-to-keep varieties of plants has also been helpful. When I read this thread, I felt that I had to reply. PDF's are not hard to keep. There are 10 year old children in my neighborhood who are successfully maintaining a vivarium with the frogs, and even breeding the frogs. Personally, I have over 50 vivariums in my home. Each one contains some poison dart frogs. Any and every color you can imagine. Orchids, bromeliads, tropical mosses, waterfalls, you name it. I really like the terrariums, but when you add a pair of bright, electric blue frogs, now you have some life!! Yes, you do have to culture, or purchase, the fruit flies. The flies we use in the hobby cannot fly. They are non-invasive and very easy to culture. They do not smell either. I have 200 cultures going at a time, there is a slight smell with this many cultures, but most visitors to our frog rooms do not even notice it. Mixing the frogs and plants to create vivariums has been the most rewarding journey of my life. I encourage everyone, not to base your opinions of keeping PDF's based on heresay, or an experience of a friend from 10 years ago. The hobby has changed drastically over the last decade. The frogs are easy to obtain, and there is soooo much info on keeping these precious little gems. Remember, everyone starts with no experience. Please fell free to email with any questions. I live in the Chicago suburbs. Pete

I've used the Green Frog tape consistently for the last few years, and have loved it. Much better results than any other painter's tape I've used. I had to repaint a half-bath a month ago, and decided to try Young House Love's method -using a specific brush that they love, without any tape. Wow -I had the room done in record time, and my edges have never been so clean and straight. So after that, I went back and touched up my son's room and my craft room, both of which I had painted in the last year. I was never 100% satisfied with the ''ceiling meets the wall' edge. Mostly because we have textured ceilings, which makes getting the tape to lay completely ice-straight is a real challenge (especially when you are teetering on a ladder). So I went back and did that line, in both rooms, using the brush recommended by YoungHouseLove, without any tape. And I'm astounded and thrilled at the ease and results. So thought I would pass this on.... Oh -and, you'd think this brush would cost a mint, right, but it was between $5-$6. Here is a link that might be useful: Young House Love's favorite brush

I said I would vote for Frog! I rather like The Amphibian Party! Amphibians are vertebrates. Sadly, most politicians today are lacking backbones!

This early warm-up and green-up should make me happy, as a gardener, right? Hmmm. So, why do I feel so uneasy about it? Perhaps it is just that it feels sort of unnatural. Well, that, and the fact that experiences tells me we usually pay a terrible price in March or April for warming up in February. It doesn't feel right to have to be worrying about snakes being out in February for the second year in a row. I cherish the snake-free winter months when I know there is zero chance of having an encounter with a venomous snake. Having highs in the 70s through the 90s in January and February, at times this year---clearly not every day---means I've lost part of that worry-free period. Our yard is rapidly greening up. Maybe the bermuda grass will green up a lot and then get slapped down by whatever cold weather remains ahead over the next month or two. Weeds are erupting everywhere daily, and I'm not happy about that. People who generally rely on pre-emergent weed killers (I don't use them, so I don't care) may find that if they've waited until their usual time to use them this year, the pre-emergents may not be useful as the weeds already may have germinated. They sure have at our house. Soil temperatures are abnormally warm and, while gardeners greet each early sprouting of desirable plants with great delight, we need to remember the weeds are sprouting early right along with them. Cool season weeds and warm season weeds are sprouting simultaneously here in our garden. Tree, I cannot believe Brent put the pig in your greenhouse! I hope he hurries up and gets the pig its own house built so you can use your greenhouse. Fleas and ticks already are bad here. I even saw ticks in January. The bird population is huge this winter. Maybe less of them than usual flew south. We have six finch feeders and I have to refill them all once or twice a week, and more often than that if we have one of those increasingly rare really cold winter days or nights. In the garden, earthworms are exceedingly plentiful, reinforcing our decision to go no-till in the front garden, and there's not nearly as many grubs and cut worms in the soil as usual. Purple martin scout birds returned around Valentine's Day, which is fairly typical. We're always happy to see them. We have about 50 billion cardinals. If the old southern belief that cardinals are the souls of your deceased relatives visiting you is true, then I've got a lot of souls hanging around here every day, and apparently more deceased relatives than I ever knew existed---and they are feasting on black oil sunflower seeds in huge quantities. The early arrival of spring weather still doesn't mean winter is over yet. Let's try to keep that in mind as we yank weeds, mow the lawn, slap mosquitoes, watch the bees visit the early blooms and otherwise enjoy the rest of what's been a fairly lovely February overall. As soon as the wet garden soil is dry enough to walk on, I'll be yanking weeds like a possessed madwoman this week, and then putting mulch in place to keep them from resprouting. I'm not sure if I've ever seen this many weeks sprouting in February before, and that includes bermuda grass and Johnson grass, which are so early this year that it is ridiculous.