It sounds like you and the other nice neighbors should form a neighborhood watch program. Make friends with the patrol officer (the one who told you the bad name for your neighborhood) and get his cell phone number. Then when there's a problem, call and report it. If the nice neighbors keep and eye out for each other, the bad neighbors will have to shape up. Even the most drunken parent gets tired of answering the door and finding a cop on the doorstep. Also, if anyone in the neighborhood is a lawyer, or if you have a lawyer friend who'll do it for free, have a letter sent to the parents (on the lawyer's letterhead) informing them that they are allowing their children to become a public nuisance and that legal action will follow. Also warning of potential drowning, etc. At the very least, that will help protect you in case something really bad happens. Ginny

Day lilies, although the seeds may move down the slope into the ditch over the years - the common orange ones are called ditch lilies around here as they are in many of the country road ditches. The ones in front of my house are full of them - unfortunately the county comes and mows the sides of the road at about the same time as they should bloom, so there isn't much of a show some years. I can hope the late freeze slowed things down so I will see lots of blooms. You might want to check with the county authorities to see how widely from the edge of the road they normally mow, AND how wide of a right of way they are entitled to mow, even if they don't do it every year. No point in planting anything but flowers in the right of way, as it will be gone sooner or later. A shrub that could take summer cutting back might do. Otherwise, almost any of the trees and shrubs native to your area should be fine - I would advise against the re-sowers like persimmon - they are in all the fencerows and roadsides here and are a major pain to weed out of my veggie and flower beds. And if the tree will overhang the road, maybe the fruiting trees wouldn't be a good idea, esp. for the purple fruited ones - plus, if it's near your drive, the birds will leave purple droppings all over. Berry bushes - blueberries, high bush cranberry, choke cherry, etc. - have attractive spring flowers and nice berries - for the birds if you don't want to pick from next to the road. Some have good fall color.

How deep should the tubers be under the soil? I was not able to grow in straw either - but have quite a few plants doing well in my planter boxes. I dug down to the bottom of the box, laid the sprouted potato in and tossed on a handful of soil. As it grew, I added more compost to the top rim of the box. This allowed coverage to about 12 inches. They look fine although time will tell how much yield will be forthcoming. Should I put up side boards on the planter box so more of the top shoots can be covered with soil? The above-ground foliage is about 8 inch tall now. I saw something similar on the Vegetable Forum - Bejay

The photo is not the best because there is no close-up but from what I see it looks like poison ivy. You can buy poison ivy killer at Home Depot or Lowes. My yard has tons of it and I save the ivy killer for the established vines. For these little guys I take a garden spade to get rid of them.