Thanks, Rita :) *beams* I"m really happy with what I've been able to do with basically a large slab of concrete. Pat, I've had some of them in larger containers for 2-3 years before dividing. I give them really good organic fertilizer or root trim, and in plastic containers, I usually drill lots of small holes in the sides to aerate the roots better and also put a wick in larger containers so roots don't rot from poor drainage. They do very well overall. This is one of the first years I forced myself not to mess around too much so I could see some of the daylilies' full potential. I have itchy fingers and am always moving/rearranging

It may depend on what the hay is from. Up here in the northern part of the state the pinestraw and hay (wheat/rye/oat) can be found at any home improvement store and not uncommon to find both at roadside stands out of the back of a trailer. Both run about $3.50 a bale and I can tell you it does add up so the longer it lasts, the less often you have to buy it and it's also time consuming to install it. The hay is used most often for seedling lawns which is something that might not be that common in south ga. You can harvest your own pinestraw pretty easily. It's best from the longleaf pines though. Using hay might return a little nitrogen, giving you some fertilizer value then again there was a topic in this forum not long ago that discussed the downsides of using grass clippings as mulch and I can't remember all of them but heat build-up was one of them. As for controlling weeds, you can simply use a pre-emergent in your planting beds or I've discovered if you get the hay about 6 months before you actually need it and let it sit outside, the seeds wont be as viable later down the road. In fact I've got a leftover bale sitting out in the yard that was left over from a lawn project in the fall and the hay seeds germinated and growing quite vigorously all around the bale. So I go and cut it periodically and stuff the new hay in with the bale. It's like having my own little hay factory. As for plants, someone else would know more about the perrenials than I although I don't see why your choice of mulch makes it different than other gardens in terms of what to grow. It may be helpful to know what the sun and soil conditions are if you didn't already mention it.

One problem with mice traps is that once the trap has sprung, if you aren't right there to clean it out, it is no longer effective for other mice in the area. My father had a cabin in the woods that would be vacant for long periods of time. A friend of his suggested this home-made trap that keeps on working. Fill a 5 gallon pail with several inches of water. Take an empty soda or beer can and poke a hole in the bottom. String a wire through the can and suspend it over the water by tying it to the handles of the pail. Smear peanut butter on the can and rest a piece of wood against the side of the pail so the mice can climb to the rim. They will jump onto the can to eat the PB, and spin the can and drop into the water. You may end up with a mess in the pail, but it will keep working until you get a chance to empty it.

Depends on what he sprayed. Here is a reponse I wrote recently tgat asked somewhat of the same question. Glyphosate (Round Up) has absolutely no residual soil activity. The chemical binds so extremely tightly to soil particles that it cannot be taken up by the roots of plants. It ONLY affects plants through contact with the leaves and non-woody stems. I have dozens of feet of broccoli, onions, cabbage, lettuce, and potatoes currently growing that can attest to that. I use glyphosate on all my beds prior to planting, and I use the higher rate, a 2% solution for my backpack sprayer, to try and kill any perennial weeds (namely bindweed that has a nasty habit of showing up after any kind of cultivation). If the herbicide that drifted onto your plants was glyposate, any that also landed on your soil simply cannot effect any plants grown in that soil. Glyphosate actually remains in the soil for quite some time. Again, as it is bound so extremely tightly to the soil particles, it is pretty much insoluble and barely moves through the soil profile. Soil texture does play a small role in this however. Coarser textured soils cannot "hold" as much glyphosate as finer textured ones, but that is easily alleviated by using a lower rate. The "rate" that may have arrived via drift would be fairly low and wouldn't have a problem binding even to beach sand. 2, 4-d on the other has shown some residual soil activity in both soybeans and corn. It is recommended (and I think is now on the label) that you wait 7-14 days after applications of this herbicide to plant. Bear in mind a couple things with this. First, this is referring to fields that are directly sprayed with the recommended rate/acre of 2, 4-d. It is not a little bit of drift. The total amount of herbicide in this case would be well below that rate. Secondly it is talking about planting seeds, not larger transplants. So there MIGHT be some potential for 2, 4-d to effect plants subsequently planted in your soil, but I think that it is pretty unlikely. Dicamba on the other hand does have a more significant residual activity and can be translocated through the roots. It is commonly mixed with 2, 4-d. However, Dicamba is usually used a pretty high rate, especially if it is being used to target re-emergence of weeds. It is not usually used at these higher rates in the stuff folks buy at the Home Depot and again, the rate of herbicide drift is already significantly reduced. Imazapyr and imazapic have long residual soil activity and can both be translocated through the roots. These are mixed with glyphosate in products like Ground Clear. Now, unless you ask your neighbor what was sprayed you can't say for sure what was used, but these are about the most commonly used herbicides by the average homeowner. If yellowing leaves, and eventual death of your prior plants were the only effects, it would point to glyphosate or a glyphosate/imazapic or imazpyr mix, as glyphosate is an an amino acid inhibitor and the other two are enzyme inhibitors none of which cause the curling and cupping like 2, 4-d and dicamba which basically overload the plant with auxin and it grows itself to death. Many brands of Aminopyralid, like Milestone, is not registered for used even in agriculture, only in rangeland, conservation areas (such as CRP field) and utility/railroad rights of way. I'm not even sure if the Bureau of Land Management has approved it's use on their lands (if they have its only been in the past couple of years). I use it regularly at the Wildlife Refuge I work at, it has been approved by the US Fish and Wildlife Service, its about the best herbicide on the market for thistles and knapweed.