Genny, I'm so sorry this happened, poor little Troy, I'm so glad she will be ok, sounds like your making some good changes for her. I have some duck eggs in the bator and will be a new duck mom soon. I have a lot to learn. Hope someone with experience can give you some insight. Take care, Sheila

I had bad dreams last night about this Garlic Cheese fiasco. I was going to every store I could find looking for Kraft garlic cheese roll because I HAD to have cheese grits for dinner. Lord luv a duck, what a night. Meldy, I've made the grits with garlic powder when I was visiting yankee cousins and they requested them, it just wasn't the same. That old cheese roll (previously put out by Kraft) was just the right thing when you added cheddar to it. Suzy, thank you for taking the time to send me the link to the Amish store. I checked out the site and later on today when I get a chance, I want to order some other things also and of course get the cheese. If it works out for my grits, Kraft will be forever in your debt. I fired a warning arrow across their bow this morning. A BOYCOTT by the genteel southern ladies casserole brigade if they don't fire up that garlic cheese vat pronto.:0)

I was up in eastern British Columbia this Spring and saw many square miles of bark beetle infestations. I was in Colorado from Steamboat Springs to Pagosa Springs this summer and saw the same thing there. I crossed the Continental divide 28 times in one trip from Montana to New Mexico. Yellowstone twice, going and coming. The destruction is devastating! I was also in Yosemite National Park where they do a lot of controlled burns as well as in the Calaveras Grove just north of there. We stayed in Oakhurst near Yosemite and Angels Camp near The Calaveras Grove of Sequoiandendron gigantea. Heat and bare ground are necessary for seed germination for these trees. That's why they burn, in addition to reduce fuel build up caused by fire suppression. The forest Service has numerous pamphlets outlining the benefits of controlled burning. They even admit it took a while to soak in. Their new goal is, diversification in both number of species, and varying ages in the same stand. Bark beetles have always been around. Good forest management might be able to minimize the effect on our forests. I can't see spraying as a viable option in the long run. We also visited the Redwood forests near Eureka, California and the forests around Mt Hood in Oregon for a week. We did some real traveling this year! Now I get to play catch up in the garden! Mike

I've been thinking about this off and on all day. Maybe it's just my poor memory, but I really can't think of anything that I ever considered doing in the garden that I'm thankful I didn't do. Generally, when I have a garden related idea, I jump right on it and get it done asap. So I could make a long list of things I've done and wish I hadn't--and lots that I'm happy I did, too. But happy I didn't do? I don't know . . . There's one thing I haven't done (yet), that I have mixed feelings about. A mulberry tree was one of the few things growing in my yard when we bought the place, and I can tell it's going to end up too big for the area where it was planted. I've considered cutting it down the past several years cause it's shading things that need sun, but I hate to remove anything that provides shade over the lawn. If I do keep it I'll probably make a pollard out of it, even though I hate deforming a tree like that. But if we keep having dry summers like the past two, I may eventually be thankful I haven't taken it out.