Being another CA gardener, here is what I know about squirrels. They live for 3 or 4 years typically. The young ones are sometimes unaware of your vegetables. Older, craftier squirrels can be real pests. They take figs and young green apples from my fruit trees. They don't particularly like oranges but will sample a few. My dad protects the apples by putting plastic bags over the apples and stapling the bags shut. Figs are more difficult to guard. If it as a good crop, there's plenty for everybody. They like the blossoms of zukes, melons, pumpkins and will eat those. They may take the fruit of these plants later on. Tomatoes they will sample, but not too many (usually the biggest ones which they bite a few times then discard for you to find). Controlling them: a dog or cat can do it. If you have hawks or raptors around, they will nail squirrels for you. I've heard you can spray cayenne pepper around and it may repel them, but cayenne pepper is expensive and I'm not sure that works anyway. Scaring them is also good. They are naturally timid and maybe they will go elsewhere, but more likely they will come back, since they don't seem very smart and are likely not to remember where that person who yells and chases at them lives. Bottom line is: they are annoying, sometimes maddening. I would find it difficult to try to kill them by any method. Some years are better than others in terms of what they sample. Perhaps feeding them peanuts or the like in one section of your yard would decrease your losses. Pests are a part of gardening though.

cough: 1. If you have already planted 8 peach trees, and are still looking for more, I invite you to consider the following sincerely offered suggestions: a) Make sure you know what is involved in growing 1-3 peach trees before you plant a lot more. Growing peaches is difficult even for experienced backyard growers. Peaches can have a lot of insect and disease problems, and usually do. Do not believe anyone who tells you they are easy to grow "organically". b) Before planting a lot of any one thing, have a plan for the use of the fruit in the event you actually get some production. 2. I have a pretty good-size backyard orchard here, and currently have 5 peach trees. I could actually get by with three good varieties, one early, one late-midseason, and one good peento (flat) type. This year, 3 of the trees produced heavily, a mature Golden Jubilee, a young Contender, and a young (white) Sugar Giant. The Contender ripened extremely early -- July 7, and, since early peaches are not much good for freezing, we had to hustle to eat or give away the more than 50 peaches this tree produced. They are all ripe within a period of a week. The average person, weighing less than 300 lbs., can eat a maximum of 2 large peaches per day. Next to ripen was Sugar Giant, a sweet peach without a lot of flavor. It suffered badly from bacterial spot, and at least half the peaches were thrown out. This peach, a modern variety from the Zaiger program in California, was a mistake to plant here. 3. Because of the 4-day Easter freeze, the Flat Wonderful peento type had only a dozen peaches, but they were truly fine eating, and early to ripen. They have a firm flesh, but wonderful flavor. Because of their odd shape, peento peaches are difficult to cut up and prepare for freezing. The little pit resides right in the middle of the doughnut, and the peach does not split apart like a large freestone. If this tree produces a full crop next season, we will again be shoveling them in shortly after Contender is gone. I would be cautious about planting any of the white peento varieties, which are likely to be far more sensitive to brown rot and other maladies. 4. Golden Jubilee is a late-midseason peach, and this mature (12 year) tree was an abundant producer this year, with about 125 peaches, of which at least 3 dozen weighed one pound or more. My spouse froze 16 quarts of these peaches, which are firm, easy to prepare, and fine for freezing. But we still have a dozen of these peaches in the refrigerator. They ripened the last few days of August and early September. 5. The bottom line here is: I really don't know what we would do with any more peaches. Once you have figured out how to grow them, and protect them against all their enemies, they can be very abundant. After two early sprays with Imidan against plum curculio, and careful thinning, all my peaches were bagged in try-on "footies", which protected them against insects (mainly oriental fruit moth) for the balance of the season. And very effectively - without any further spraying. Footie installation is, however, tedious, and calls for some acquired skill. 6. If you are going to grow peaches, you should become familiar as soon as possible with diseases such as bacterial spot (on the fruit), bacterial canker (on the limbs), and insects like the plum curculio (early) and oriental fruit moth (all season long). After that, you can get some advice here on how to deal with those problems. You should select the varieties to plant very carefully, based on such factors as their ripening times, and resistance to diseases like bacterial spot. Planting what Home Depot happens to have on hand is not the best way to choose your peach varieties. 7. Without considerable effort to learn the essentials of peach growing, you can plant 100 trees and still not get any decent, usable peaches. On the other hand, two or three carefully chosen peach varieties, with the right care, can produce enough peaches to make your family tired of eating peaches, and the neighbors too. Don Yellman, Great Falls, VA

I just read through this 3 year forum. It's nice to see great questions and answers. I work with mason bees on the commercial side. A couple of points. - unless you have chalkbrood, there really is no point to washing your mason bees. If you have harvested your cocoons and separated out the cocoons from the mites/mud/pollen balls, that's all that is needed. Any residual mite on the cocoons doesn't harm anything. The first foraging trip to flowers has mites on the mason bee again. If you have chalkbrood, wash with bleach. Our website has great pictures on pests and processes. Look at http://www.crownbees.com/home-gardner/harvesting for more information. - There are a variety of straws/inserts/reeds to be found on the internet. We have a new one out, the 'EasyTear' that doesn't need an insert, you can tell if it's used by a mason bee, and tears open easily. Reeds are also a good option as well. Lastly, a few questions asked about other mason bees beyond the Blue Orchard Bee. We're helping people be successful with the Japanese Orchard Bee in the east coast and are on the lookout to help others find/manage more. Osmia Algaia (Berry bee) in Oregon is a good one, and there are a few other Blueberry bees found. We're looking to help understand location, crops that can be supported, and nesting practices for each bee. Native bees are vital to pollination. Continue to give your bees away to your friends and help them succeed! Dave Hunter, Owner Crown Bees http://www.crownbees.com Here is a link that might be useful: Crown Bees

My dad lives in Sandhills of North Carolina, and he has a 40-50 ft long needle "Jack" pine tree that is about 40 years old that is doing the same thing he discovered it this summer this problem is going all the way up the tree!! He calls it "crying" any help would be GREATLY APPRECIATED!!! Photos included!! Some of these are of the tree it's self to show how tall it is and some are of the rings going up that are the "crying" the others are of the sap, which is of a wax like consistency... thank you again!!! Deloris Dever