Stefan's interesting words on Brix reminded me that French farmers have been known to remark that strawberries used to be half the size and productivity but twice the flavor. Similar remarks have been made in the US. A study of tomatoes picked 'mature green' and ripened vs those vine-ripened showed a decrease in not only beta-carotene but lycopene during ripening of the greenies, an increase for the vinies. Another, very cheap device that may be useful is paper chromatography as done by E E Pfeiffer in the 1930s, and by biodynamic folks since. The findings are often quite striking, and more convincing than Kirlian photography. There's an Ohio dowser who has been used successfully in archeological digs, and dowses for all manner of ends, including the analysis of a highway's high accident rate. Here, however, as he told me, "The rod isn't magic; I'M magic." If a device is either cheap or internal, it should be tried. I draw the line at radionics, both costly and derived from a World War 2 vintage ESP device patented by a Mr Hieronymus, still alive last I checked. Pet