There's a thread on Mons tiller fries in the sun, see below: "Mine fried after an hour or two in the sun, more so than my other tea roses so it's no longer with me in my hot garden. Clementina Carbonieri did the same thing. A pity, since both are beautiful roses. Ingrid." ***** From Straw: I'm adding own-root Yves Piaget on my rose-order for next year, along with Young Lycidas and Romantica "The McCartney" rose. I researched again on Yves Piaget: the person who grows Yves both as own-root vs. grafted reported wimpiness for both. Someone from PNW (rainy & cool) climate also reported Yves being wimpy. Robert Rippetoe in his Rancho Mirage climate of exreme heat, drought, and alkaline sandy soil .... grows Yves Piaget and uses it in his breeding program ... so it must be very good for him. I figured out what makes Romanticas works: fluffy potting soil for the roots to get big, then transfer to fertile clay. I have Yves Piaget's children bred by Robert Neil, I put gypsum in the pots, and they went beserk with growth. Ingrid in this forum once grew Yves, but it didn't do well in the heat ... she has loose de-composed granite soil high in potassium. That's different from Ingrid in Thousand Oaks, who has clay. According to Wikipedia, high potassium or high nitrogen drives down calcium. The Romanticas have a higher demand for calcium than other roses, they are very sensitive to salt, so saline soil is not suitable. Calcium in gypsum is used to de-salt saline soil. That explains why Mons.Tillier works for Jaspermplants in Arizona, but didn't work for Ingrid with high-potassium soil. Arizona is alkaline clay high in calcium like my Chicagoland clay ... I'm next to a limestone quarry. Calcium is known to firm up tissue of plants, and helps with drought-tolerance, which explains for the success of Romanticas in my limestone clay. Here's an excerpt on calcium from the site http://www.oxyfertil.com/royaume-uni/role-ca-mg-plante.html · increases the plant tissues' resistance and allows for more erect stems · contributes to normal root system development · increases resistance to outside attack Here is a link that might be useful: Does your Mons. Tillier fry in the sun? This post was edited by Strawberryhill on Fri, Jul 12, 13 at 10:58

Michelle, Congrats on a great thread. It is very rare to have a thread attain 100 responses and you clearly will go way over that. Another first for Camelot in SW VA Fritillary (sp.) I couldn't get close enough to determine what species. BTW, This beats my earliest Fritillary ever by 3 days. mike

Your welcome!! Prizes - As you can see, Melinda got her prize for first place (it was looking obvious she was going to win). Thanks for all the pictures Melinda, they help keep the month interesting for everyone! Runner-up prizes to Emily (2nd place Thank you for sharing so many photos too!) and to Beth who got the 6 points for keeping (mostly) to this month's swap (one set of towels, two packets of seeds, card - there was an extra of a chocolate bar - but she was closest to the simple swap guidelines). Susan - your package shows out for delivery. Hope you're not disappointed as I keep to the simple swap and only send listed items (I do put it on my profile so folks know that about me!). Thanks for sharing about the vinegar. I have a pressure washer that's clogged - I'll try that! Looked at the split cupped and double narcissus at Van Engelen https://www.vanengelen.com/flower-bulbs-index/narcissi/split-cup.html and https://www.vanengelen.com/flower-bulbs-index/narcissi/double.html and didn't see yours. The American Daffodil Society has a DAFFSEEK link to photo database if you feel like trolling about there https://daffodilusa.org. Heidi - beautiful tulips and that phlox is going to be gorgeous when it fills in! TODAY is National Honesty Day (so honestly, I have too much stuff!!!) http://holidayinsights.com/moreholidays/April/honestyday.htm

Got pepper seedlings pricked and repotted. Just pepperonchini, I need to do a round of canning this year. A dozen pots, hopefully I'll be busy later this summer. Lots of flower seed started, some herb seed. Daffs are up and yellow all over the place. Haven't opened any of the caps in over a week. Been busy at work and then we got some of that cold snowy crappy. Only a scant inch. It's supposed to warm up more this week so I'll start peeking then. Rain is coming in and I need to open the garden caps to make sure everything is good and wet out there. I need to do some cleaning out on the porch. Wormwood cuttings I took too late last year and didn't really take need to be sorted out from the lots that are doing well. Why can't they do that neatly so I don't have to sort the pots out, lol. Some of my flower seedlings are getting big enough that I need to start their sheltered hardening off with the cooler temps and night hours out in the porch. So cleaning I must do. Been sorting out the gardening supply stock. I've got plenty of dried toothache blossoms on hand and some hot peppers to use up... so once it's sunny I'll put out some jars of tea for spraying the new tree planting out back. The combo of hot from the peppers and numbing from the toothache plant can be disturbing to critters that want to nibble. Running low on sugar ferments so I'll have to make more this year.