Thank you Chris. In part I am going to count on your complacency and all the great advise and criticism I get as I go along. Your soil does definately have a lot of clay compared to mine. I am going to try to make up for that by adding organic materials. I read where someone put so much compost into their pumpkin patch one year that the patch became a compost pile with very high temperatures. I won't go that far. Was the name of the offender a guy who also participates in "pumpkin boat races? I'll never tell. Marv in Altoona PA