The most dangerous HVX infected hosta is the one that shows no indication at all. A hosta can look perfectly normal and be infected and certain to transmit HVX if both the infected and new host hosta have their juices come in contact. Sanitizing tools and assuming every hosta may have HVX is the best and only way to almost surely prevent spread. Other virus, that can be transmitted by insects, are far more susceptible to spreading throughout a garden. Testing negative for HVX can give a false sense of security as it only tells you that the hosta doesn't have HVX and it could have something far more contagious. Indications of HVX wouldn't cause me to be alarmed. If it clearly matched the photos available in the Hosta Library, I would simply kill it and ensure the roots were dead before doing any digging (3-4 months would be reasonable) If the indications looked like another virus I would religiously spray to keep spreading by insects and 'Roundup' the plants if I was convinced it was a virus. If you are aware of how HVX spreads, there is no reason to panic and digging it up without killing it is a mistake...in my opinion. Others may have differing opinions, but they are wrong. Jon

Sheri, The blossoms themselves have nothing to do with blossom end rot. It is really just a physiological problem involving calcium uptake, and the blossom has nothing to do with that--once the fruit has set, the blossom is just "an innocent bystander". You can pick the blossom off after a fruit has formed, but it won't have any effect either way. I think you and I both should be VERY grateful that our plants are alive and producing in this wild and wacky weather, because it appears we are in the minority who are having success. One of my "old rancher" neighbors stopped by to see me yesterday. He said he was being nosy and just wanted to know how my tomatoes were doing. I told him that it was a rough year and that I was getting ripe tomatoes, but not as many and not as early as in previous years. He told me that "no one" in Love County was getting any tomatoes at all---well, that is, except for the two of us. He ran down the long list of tomato growers we both know, and some that I don't know, describing what was wrong with their plants or what had happened to their plants. He described the plants of one of his friends who farms down on sandy river-bottom soil as being totally defoliated ("not a single leaf") and wanted to know why. I told him I assumed they were in high water underground since he was so close to the river, and that the leaf drop was a sign the plants weren't going to make it. He said that was what he thought too. He then asked me what I was doing with my tomatoes, and I told him we'd been eating them. I told him I made a big pot of spaghetti sauce earlier in the week, and a big pot of tortilla soup later in the week. He asked if I made them with my green tomatoes, and I told him I used ripe ones. (I didn't really understand his question----was he trying to imply I didn't have ripe tomatoes?) Anyway, I think maybe he was hoping I would offer him some of our ripe tomatoes---but I didn't. I have plans for them, and I know he IS getting ripe tomatoes, so I am not giving him mine. What I think he REALLY wanted was for me to give him 5 or 10 gallons of ripe tomatoes to take and give away to all his farmer/rancher buddies who have suffered a tomato crop failure this year. I did that in 2004, but I am not giving as many away this year because I feel like the harvest could cease anytime, especially if the rain continues. So, there you have it....I am being selfish and stingy and not giving away tomatoes this year, and I am unapologetic about it. In the good years, I give away hundreds of tomatoes, but in the bad years, everyone else is on their own. After what I have had to go through to get this harvest, it is not walking out the door with someone else. Isn't that a terrible attitude--I am NOT usually like that. I really cherish each and every tomato I get this year, though, because it has been such a hard year and a large harvest is not guaranteed. With six inches of rain since Friday evening, I am afraid my plants are in serious trouble. Watch your plants---they can go downhill VERY fast at this point. If the yellowing progresses rapidly up the plants, you can take cuttings from the healthiest foliage at the top of the plant and root them in water or soil. In just a couple of weeks those cuttings will provide you with new plants in case yours decline/die quickly. I have gone from a garden full of semi-healthy plants to a garden full of dead plants in about a month's time in very rainy weather. Once the sun comes out and begins stressing plants already stressed by excessive moisture, early blight and other problems gather steam like a fast freight train. Dawn

I disagree with the above statement. There are situations where using an herbicide to achieve some goal is less disruptive to that plant community and its associated fauna than would a physical or cultural approach. Each and every situation must be evaluated on its own terms. The amount of actual active ingredient that is used in cut/treat is very small. Let's say you're trying to remove rampant common buckthorn from a wooded area: How, short of cut/treat herbicide application would you-lukifell-propose to accomplish this? Even when herbicides are used, this is a daunting task. Of course, I'm speaking from experience, not from some philosophical platform. But all techniques are potentially worthwhile. So I ask again lukifell: In a serious infestation of common buckthorn in wooded property, how would you eradicate, or even begin to get these things under control? The floor is yours! +oM PS....Many people, and you, lukifell, appear to be one of them, mistakenly use the word "poison" when what you really mean is "toxic". Poisons can kill a person right then and there. Very, very few of our commonly formulated pesticides are poisonous. Most are toxic though. I'm guessing you think this to be a semantic argument. It is not. The thousands of times I've applied glyphosate to vegetation that was unwanted in its given setting, I never poisoned anything, except for that very vegetation. Pest control products simply do not "poison" everything around them. Are there cases where things went badly? Of course. Think about all the atrazine (still) getting applied to millions of acres of corn in this country; That's a bad situation. Glyphosate or Garlon in a cut/treat usage for invasive woody plant control? Laughably on a different level of concern. Or....glyphosate being used on millions of acres of corn and soybeans of the "Roundup-Ready" variety? Yeah, that's causing the emergence of "super weeds" that have resistance to this common herbicide. That coukld be real bad in the not too distant future. But the way you butted into this thread, with your big pronouncement indicates to me that you're a beginner. That's okay-we all start somewhere. I would say though that it can be better to lay back and learn for a while before shooting your mouth off, or whatever keyboard equivalent you like. Your statement is wildly off the mark.

Okay. You asked. LAYERS AND MILKERS If there had been an Oscar for Best Aunt, my Aunt Kate would have won. She became a legend in our family, not because of anything great that she did, but just for being, well, for being Aunt Kate. Apparently she had a peculiar immune system that prevented her from acquiring much of the education she was exposed to. Some of her remarks are still quoted and passed on to each new generation in our family. She had no worldly goods to leave behind. As a six-year-old on a summer visit, though, she gave me an intangible gift. Being the youngest in a large family, I was never given any chores or responsibilities. Aunt Kate changed that. She took me to the hen house and showed me how to rob the nests. She explained the purpose of the nest eggs. Foolish hens! henhen Could they not see those were doorknobs, not real eggs? One morning she gave me the basket and told me to gather the eggs. Me? I had never done anything on my own. Aunt Kate was trusting me to go, alone, to the hen house and bring back those eggs! The nests were warm and the hens were singing their hen songs. And I was gathering eggs, counting as I went. Wearing my pride for all to see, I returned to the house and handed over the basket. No one stood up to cheer. Did no one notice this metamorphosis? Did I not look older? Taller, wiser? Gathering eggs may not have been exciting to the others, but to me, I had just made my first trip into another world, a world that a child had entered with an invisible passport. Aunt Kate not only had chickens. She also had a cow. Now, real live cows don't look like the ones in the picture books. They don't really say moo, either. I had watched Aunt Kate milk: she even tried to teach me. I still remember the technique, though I have never had any desire to repeat it. The second trip into Grown-up Land came one afternoon when Aunt Kate asked me to bring the cow up to the shed. I had passed egg-gathering with a good grade. Bringing the cow in must be postgraduate work. All I needed to do, she said, was hold the chain and the cow would follow me. That might have worked for Aunt Kate, but that old cow was having none of it with this puny little kid. Old Bessie dug her feet into the dirt and those huge eyes dared me to pull on that chain. Didn't she know I had been emancipated? I wasn't just a kid. I had graduated from egg-gathering. Surely I could get a cow to follow me. I pulled. Old Bessie stood her ground. I tugged. She gave her head a swift shake and a twist and bawled something that definitely didn't sound like moo. The chain went sliding through my hand, leaving a trail of blood where there had been . . . had been . . . a wart on my finger. The wart was gone. The cow was gone. Dripping blood and crying for my mother, I was a little kid again. I knew I had lost my credentials. I was a dropout from cow school. I decided that egg-gathering was just about right for a six-year-old. What did I really learn? Just this: it takes more than a week at Aunt Kate's to turn a kid into a grownup. I didn't get my diploma, but Aunt Kate still gets my vote for that Oscar. © Sue Hamilton