Hail to thee, blithe spirits......! (especially Arnold and Kelly) At a nursery the other day, I acquired a coir hanging basket liner, with the intent of cutting it up to fit into 4" square plastic pots on the bottom , to contain the potting soil from coming out of all those holes that manufacturers seem to think are needed for drainage. In the old days, I used sphagnum moss crammed into the pots and it worked very well. I can't always find bags of sm nowadays, so I hit upon the use of SHOP TOWELS. These are rolls of thick blue paper towels available at Albertson's and most Hardware stores. I cut each in quarters, fold to fit in each square 4" pot, then fill with mix , then plant. It lasts long enough till repotting or transplanting time, and is certainly very economical. The sphagnum moss was ideal, especially when one could find rolls of compressed moss to use in hanging baskets. Some of it always lasted at repotting and could be used again. Also roots could be dislodged from it with minimal damage. Prior to this I used wire screening cut-to-fit in the bottom of the pots, but at repotting time root damage was excessive. My current method is dictated by the amount of things to be potted up. Since becoming a PBS member, and being a staunch supporter of the BX offerings - (WHAT an understatement!) I now purchase pots by the case, SUPERSOIL by the ten bag lots, sand by the six bag lots (they're so HEAVY!) and I now suffer from carpel tunnel syndrome from all the labels and lists that must be made. I owe all of this to that warlock Jim Waddick, who suggested to me that I purchase a computer, from which I learned about PBS, and through the loving and benign help (or is it wicked and malign - since it has become almost an obsession) of Cathy Craig and Mary Sue Ittner, among others, to try planting things I never tried before. Today is totally different from the way things were when I started. Working with 40 to 50 pots at a clip, I no sooner finish a session, when another BX offering pops up - sometimes three in one month! when I must needs (or is that needs must?) start again. In a way, I sometimes laugh out loud when I consider that I started purchasing from the BX mostly to help out the organization which I assumed was small and struggling to make it - WHO KNEW! that it would become the behemoth it threatens to be! To get back to the subject: What I am presently looking for is a source for coir compressed squares say 4" square, which can be popped into a pot prior to filling it with potting soil. Working with large quantities at a time (such as a commercial nursery does) there may be an outlet for such an item - it would save a lot of time, a commodity of which some of us are in short supply. I did explore the websites provide by Kelly (I think) and the http://vgrove.com/wholesale.htm site offers something called pot covers with no further details. Maybe I should consider the chips? Any info will be greatly appreciated. Also, a source of square 4" pots with NO BOTTOM HOLES - only four slits on the sides like Farrand Jardiniere pots (no longer being made, Farrand informs me) would also be appreciated. ROBERT PBS 10038 U S A - ALL THE WAY !!!Get more from the Web. FREE MSN Explorer download : http://explorer.msn.com/