This is a new topic that we've probably had some time ago, but I was inspired to reintroduce it by Jim McKenney's suggestion that there is a polarity in gardening with rare bulbs at one end and tomatoes at the other. I have a large crescent-shaped border by my driveway that is packed with winter-to-spring bulbs, and I'm always looking for things that will follow the bulbs and flower through summer without needing supplemental water that would harm the bulbs. The past couple of years I've been direct-sowing various annuals there to see what will happen. Some good results have been had with annual poppies (Shirley and somniferum), Convolvulus tricolor, the new color strains of Calendula, Campanula incurva (a sort of prostrate Canterbury bells), and Antirrhinum braun-blanquetii (no doubt other Antirrhinum species would also do well). This year I sowed a bunch of seed that had been stored in a box in the refrigerator and for some reason dumped in a packet of tomato seed. To my surprise, the tomatoes germinated and grew on through several frosts, and now they're flowering and setting fruit. Although tomatoes are ordinarily thought of as liking lots of irrigation, these must be flourishing because of the deep sand-and-gravel mulch on the bed. And, of course, the nutrient preferences of tomatoes and bulbs are similar: low nitrogen, high phosphorus and potassium. Thus, no polarization: you can grow tulips in spring and food in summer in the same place, and you need not depend on the "Master Gardeners" among your acquaintance for tomatoes. I will admit that my normal tomato patch is in the vegetable garden, which is off out of sight of the ornamental garden and is indeed a bare tilled plot in winter, except for the leeks and other vegetables that keep in the ground here. What plants -- ornamental or edible -- do others sow over their bulb beds? Jane McGary Northwestern Oregon, USA