4 more thoughts about mulch that might help. I am enthusiastic about using it in the garden, so want to share how you can get it free or cheaply & make it work for you. Try: 1. wood shavings --sold at feed stores & the compressed bales around here are about $8 or so for white or pine shavings. Cedar is $1 or so more. Don't buy at a pet store because you'll pay too much! Once opened you really have a lot of material that doesn't decompose quickly. We've used them as bedding for chickens & applied as mulch (manure + bedding) in fall-very early spring. Then once no more smell, we go ahead & pull back a bit to plant. Some gets mixed with the soil, but doesn't matter too much because soil is rich with manure. If the bags get torn you can purchase at a discount. Ask if they're not marked down. Now & then I'll buy a damaged bag of cedar for perennial veg & fruits because it lasts so long, smells great, & looks nice, too. 2. spoiled hay or straw bales or sweepings from the feed store work fine because once the seeds sprout they don't sprout again... Wet the bales or sweepings to encourage sprouting before you open & spread. Once mulch is in place stir up a bit by hand or with a hand trowel once a week & pull the taller sprouts letting them fall in place to add to the mulch... eventually all the seeds are sprouted. Our March planted raspberry bed mulch is all done sprouting now & looks really nice now that the sun has faded it all a uniform color. If you leave it be & let the sprouts get too big it's more of a problem. 3. used grass hay with manures... Now, used goat hay (manure & they're grass hay bedding) is a bit more weedy, so wouldn't use in veg. garden w/o composting because of the manure as well. A couple is bringing their used goat hay about every 6 weeks instead of paying $10 to dispose of it at a recycler who is piling up as compost just like I'm doing. I've had 3 loads now since late March. The 1st I picked up & spread as the bottom lasagna layer in an ornamental flower bed & the other 2 she's brought me. It's a bit of work to turn that long pile now, but I'll be using it as a feeding mulch when ready. 4. alfalfa hay doesn't sprout at all In my area horse owners are very eager to get rid of spoiled hay as they need the storage for their good hay & don't want it around for the horses to get into. 5. County fair used animal bedding Find out when your fair is held & offer to pick up the used bedding. Livestock, horses, rabbits, & poultry go through a lot of bedding during shows. In our area they're all using the pellets of sawdust except for chickens. The fairgrounds might be eager to let you come get it that last evening of fair or the next morning. They may have to pay by the pound to haul it away. We used to put it all by the horse barn at our fair & it was a mix of all the different animals. If you're willing to come pick up when the rabbits are released you can have all the rabbit bedding + manure you want and that manure can be used straight away. Hope that helps, Corrine

Thank you for further opinions/advice. ashes_of_the_fire those roots are gorgeous! For most part I tend to slightly underwater my orchids, before the ailment that is (I always thought it was fine as they flowered and looked healthy) and the roots would be slightly thinner than yours. I am especially grateful for the step by step instructions. I will definitely need them as this will be my first repotting on my own! (mum refused to help as she says last time she got involved it got them to the current state). I have something by Westland called 'orchid compost'. It says it has organic matter, bark and wood fibre. This is the only thing suitable at the shop nearest to us (and that is 30 minutes away). There is another shop that is about 1 hour away in another zone that requires 2 buses. But I am not sure that one is much better. I think I'll repot the worst first (I will do it tomorrow morning when there is more light and might post photos in case I need advise of whether they are actually alive)... to see how they take to this compost. And order the following online: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Elite-Orchid-Compost-Range-for-Phalaenopsis-5-Litres-/261365464855 Does that seem like a good mix? Apparently one of the orchids is not actually a Phalaenopsis that mum owns (since it hasn't had flowers in years I did not know any better). Though she cannot remember its name. meyermike_1micha thank you for the tip ... I have been reading many websites and books about caring for orchids, but none actually go into any sort of detail. Something I read a year ago said that orchids can grow without any medium! in baskets but would require very frequent sprays. Wow! Maybe I need to do that to avoid the bugs. jane__ny thank you for the link! It is very helpful. As I said the books I could get from the library and some websites I came across weren't as helpful. Most of the books had various pictures and species, and talked about reproduction, illness and the fact that orchids depending on the type like various mediums including moss, bark, and something else. No one ever went into basics of how to physically water them (just state that you can spray or pour). Cloths were a strategy to get rid of insects. They have only been covered in them for about 3 months. These bugs are a pain to get rid of ... and one of the solutions is placing a layer of sand on top of the peat ... it cuts air supply to them and cuts their wings when they crawl out. I was a bit apprehensive of doing that (since who knows what the sand will be infected with!) So I saw someone's solution of placing denim to a similar effect ... break the cycle. Each fly lays many many eggs ... and the problem multiplies. Most of these I read were for houseplants ... as no one wrote about infected orchids. But the things is one of the orchids I bought was already infected and it was in bark! So it does happen. Probably not as frequently. I know most of the solutions I was trying were damaging the health of the plants, but as I mentioned these stuff eat roots ... and reproduce fast. So the fact that some of the orchids are still alive is pretty much a miracle. I do not wish this infection on anyone's plants. Oh and I place my stupidity/naivety to the fact that for many years that I have owned orchids they were healthy and I never saw what I have been seeing in the past 3/4 of the year. Thank you so much for your support! I also include the picture of the flies! (this was when the situation was improving too! before then you couldn't see the yellow ... it is a lot a lot better now). Just about 3 or 4 flies per sticker. Another quick question ... do I need to dry out the orchid compost completely before planting? (that is where I went wrong with the peat apparently) Lija P.S. Liquid Oxygen contains Hydrogen Peroxide. It was advised to me as it apparently burns up the larvae which seemed like a pleasant thought.

I totally agree that earworms appear from nowhere--and won't go away! I can awake in the middle of the night and there's a song playing over and over and over in my head. The ones I don't mind too much are hymns; at least I'm 'listening' to something uplifting.

Harlequin Bugs can be a problem in the garden although some sites with good information (those that are not too interestred in selling you something) will say they are more interested in plants we consider "weeds". Most every source of good information I have found says control, if necessary, is best acheived through hand picking. Here is a link that might be useful: Harlequin Bugs