I doubt I know anything that you all don't, but in what is closing in on one year of gardening, I have learned: 1. Gardening is insanely addictive. I planted some red annual salvia and white petunias to cover and a stump. They looked so pretty, I was hooked! 2. Assume nothing! I live in extreme south Georgia. We don't have killing frosts, right? WRONG! I still had about half dozen or so of those original salvia growing and blooming in their bed. They looked gorgeous, until about a week ago. Now, they are brown goo. 3. Not everything likes to be heavily fertilized. Another member here (debbiep) lives right up the road from me. Over the summer she helped feed my growing addiction. She gave me two little tomato plants. I put them in my little, tiny edibles bed, dumped a ton of my guinea pig mulch on them and crossed my fingers. In short order, I had two huge, gorgeous plants, and one tomato between the two of them. :P 4. Irises are my absolute favorite flower, and despite all the gorgeous, diverse varieties that exist, there is no real red. 5. Your significant other may not always appreciate or even understand your passion. After I announced my plans to expand my UGA beds to include an homage to the other 11 SEC schools, my husband told me I was $E&(#W$&(# (insert your own pejorative) nuts. 6. Your children do not know the difference between seeds carefully harvested and laid out on paper plates or coffee filters to dry and trash. The same goes for newspaper and cardboard saved for weed barrier. :o I am certain there is more, I will try to share useful information as I think of it. Christan

Gardenrod, All of us are still learning. I say often that I learn something new here every single day and it is so very true. As Diane said, we have an amazing group of people here. My attitiude is that we are much stronger/better prepared for anything as a group than any one of us ever could be alone. Besides that, who else understands our gardening obsession better than other folks similarly afflicted? Diane, I've always done the cold treatment too, but not really as part of a deliberate plan. Rather, my tiny tomato seedlings get the cold treatment when they are kicked off the lighted seedstarting shelf and moved out to the back porch to make room for other seeds I need to start. Before I started moving the plants out to the porch while they were very small, they got big and lush indoors but didn't adapt as easily once they were moved outdoors to harden off. Clearly, they'd had it easy for too long. Now that they are exposed to cooler temps earlier, they seem tougher and hardier even though not as tall and lush. Maybe this year I'll proceed with a plan and move them out when they "should be" put out for cold treatment instead of just haphazardly doing it when the plant shelf is too full and I have the urge to grow more seeds. Chandra, As others so aptly pointed out, a certain amount of exposure at a young age benefits tomatoes in ways that we may not fully understand. Plants exposed to cold treatment at a certain stage seem to produce more heavily and to perform better later on. By contrast, peppers (and I think from my observations this applies a bit more to hot peppers than to sweet peppers) that are exposed to cooler temps earlier in the year can remain stunted for a long time and unproductive for the entire season. I used to transplant peppers out into the ground at about the same time I transplanted tomatoes. I struggled for years to make sense of why my pepper plants looked fine and grew well but didn't produce heavily until fall. The tomatoes were producing just fine, so I knew there was something I didn't know and didn't understand about the conditions pepper plants needed for optimal performance. After learning about the pepper plant/temperature connection, I started holding my pepper plants inside longer and waiting to transplant them out a couple of weeks later than the tomato plants. The difference in yield was impressive. Now it is just a part of my routine. I haven't done objective testing with a control group, but I'd say that by holding the pepper plants inside longer and planting them only after the weather/soil are at the temps they like, I am harvesting twice as much as before, and I am harvesting 4 to 6 weeks earlier than before. Last year, the pepper harvest began in earnest so early that it surprised even me. My plants went into the ground in early May, and I was harvesting sweet peppers and jalapenos in mid-June. It probably did help the hot peppers somewhat that we were hot earlier in the season than usual since they thrive on heat. I just pulled out my harvest record book from last year and I harvested 10 lbs. 2 oz. of jalapeno peppers on June 15th. That is the largest early harvest of hot peppers that I've ever had. If I was not already convinced that planting peppers late was a useful technique, last year's June harvest convinced me. I use two fans for circulation in the guest room where I keep my seed starting shelf. The ceiling fan stays on 24/7 and then I have an oscillating fan I use to toughen up plants. The light movement of the circulating air helps the plants develop stronger, stockier stems. You know, the same thing is true of trees. Young trees that are tightly staked so they cannot bend much in the wind are weaker over their lifetime than trees that were not tightly staked or that were not staked at all. With the trees, the early exposure to real wind helps build stronger wood. By exposing our tomato plants to circulating air while they are inside, we are preparing them better for the stronger winds they'll be exposed to outdoors. As for the effect of soil temperatures on germination of seeds, the most reliable data I've ever seen is that on Tom Clothier's website. I'll find it and link it. Using his chart, you can see exactly which temperatures give the best germination rates. However, most of us have to start seeds of some types a bit earlier than the optimum temperature on his charts because we're in a constant race to "make" our garden grow and produce before the high summer heat shuts it down. Carrots, for example, sprout quickly in very warm to hot soil, but grow poorly in it. So, we have to settle for lower germination rates and slower germination times so that our carrots can grow during the time when soil and air temperatures are optimal for them. Finally, much of what I know/understand about soil and air temperatures and their effect on vegetable plant growth and production I learned from Dr. Cotner's book. Before his book came out, I understood that some crops go into the ground earlier and some later but didn't truly understand exactly how temperatures affect growth and performance. I still have to refer to his book to doublecheck the temperatures various veggies need, but at least now I know enough to check the book for his recommendations instead of blindly following the calendar, or just "guessing" that a particular vegetable can go into the ground at a certain time. Dawn Here is a link that might be useful: Effect of Temperature on Seed Germination

I go there just now and see that "someone liked your comment at Houzz." So I click and get the name of that person and a link. Sue, I think you might be clicking on the wrong link in your email. I get an email with subject line... Someone liked your comment on Houzz!‏ When I open it, it says canyonwind liked your comment on discussion: Garden Web messaging is back without having to follow one another! See Comment When I click on the See Comment it will take me to the very comment that canyonwind 'liked' I just 'liked' your post above, so you might (if you have it set up) have an email that says Someone liked your post. I think it will say liked post, if you are the OP (Original Poster) of the thread. I think it will say liked comment if it is your reply in a thread. Go check your email, and see if you have one for me 'liking' your post. (the other) Sue Say Goodnight Irene

Esmeralda, You have a lot of new green growth starting on your parent fig tree. This is good. Prune back all the dead stems on it to its crown. Don't mess with any of the new shoots at this time. Picture #1. Pot up that severed, separate stem you show, and see if it takes. Don't bury the green growth....plant the stem with them just poking up from the soil surface. Water sparingly, but no drying out, please. Push a thin stake into the soil, right next to the stem. Tie the stem to it in two places to keep the stem stable, not wobbling in place. When all the green shoots of the parent fig tree are new, green stems, and they are about 10" tall, choose the best, straightest 6 of them, spaced evenly apart. These are your new multi trunks of your rejuvenated fig tree. Remove the rest. Don't worry about all the gnarly crown wood left. Let it alone. It's not hurting the tree what so ever. Just continue to remove any additional fresh green growth that comes from it after you select the 6 new trunks. You will see new green shoots emerge from that crown for years. Keep removing them when they first emerge. They will get fewer and fewer in number in time. Keep after them. Moses