I too love hummers! I bought a house with a ton of Monarda and Echinachea in place...so they were already in the area. In the spring, they hit my feeders, petunias and fuschia...then they make for the summer blooms. They are very territorial...I added a second feeder to keep them from fighting with each other. Mine are skiddish compared to my friend who has a bit more in her yard. They are hard to get a good photo unless you dedicate a lot of time to camping with the camera. They do get inquisitive as they get used to you...I love when they hover under the hose when I'm hand watering... Here is the best pic I've been able to get of one in my yard through a screen...a bit hard to see... .

Kristy the disk that was out of place was pushed against the syatic nerve,the Dr said he might have some numbness(sp)in his leg for a while but,I don't think Mike really knew what is was gonna be like,I do know he is having a time with it,he goes back to the Dr Monday so hopefully they will be able to tell more about it. Now Steph my DIL that just had the baby,is having some problems with her heart,she went to the Dr today and they told her it seems to be skipping a beat,she is only 25 years old,she has to go back on the 23rd for more test,so please pray for her. Please everybody don't get upset with me I have to talk to someone,and you guys really seem to care,but I am sorry if my post bothers anyone,I just can't seem to handle all this alone. Hugs Bonnie

Nana, I got on last night with the intention of reading all the posts and commenting....of course when I saw the word "purple", that was the first one I read being me. When I went to comment I just started falling apart and realized I couldn't act 'normal' afterall. I'd finished writing my Dad's obituary and picking a photo for it a few hours earlier, so that's probably why I was a mess. tho I seem to be staying that most of the time. I'm clearing things from Dad's room, except things special to me, because I 'have' to. I need to see that room in a different way as soon oas I can. It hurts too much otherwise. The hospital bed has to go back to the VA, so I hope to find some different furniture for that room in the future. The gigantic old dresser needs to go, but Zorro can keep the easy chair. He claimed that years ago. ;o) Basically I'm just donating Dad's clothes and going thru loads of paperwork. He saved every scrap of paper and trying to sort the necessary from the useless has been a challenge. After Mom died 10 yrs ago, and he moved in with me, he really kept very little. "Stuff" was her thing, not his. He stopped driving when she died too, their car was totaled in the wreck and he didn't want another one. So Dad's belongings are very few, except his clothes and a lot of framed family photos. I'm so glad I don't have a lot to go thru again, like when we lost her. this is the photo I chose for his obituary, its how I'll always remember him with his wonderful smile, ready to tell someone a joke. hugs, Karen

Hello, Bart. I knew that was you. I'm afraid my thanks are due to you rather than the other way around, as I'll be looking into site you give in your message: the beetles are a plague here too, especially Oxythyrea funesta (and it is funesta for a fact). About Coldiretti, we're members, and DH just walked into the local office and asked for information and was given the phone number of the Phytosanitary Service. Since it was for Piacenza it won't do you any good. You probably have a Coldiretti office in your area where you could ask for information; Coldiretti seems to provide some services to other people than members, and they have always struck me as helpful types, so they could tell you whom to contact. They're a capillary kind of organization, not one of the sort where you have to make an appointment and go to the city to find someone to talk to, but very much on the ground and available to people with questions. I don't remember the site I found last time and I didn't write it down, but if you do a search on 'piralide del bosso' it will bring up all kinds of sites and a lot of information. Once I got confirmation that Bacillus thuringensis subsp. Kurstaki was the proper treatment--this seems to be the official line--we bought it at the local...what in the U.S. would be a feed store, or at least that's its nearest equivalent...and did some heavy duty spraying. We used the commercial product, that employed by farmers, and a backpack sprayer. This was in powder form and cost €45, and while I doubt we'll use more than a small percentage of the stuff I believe it will still work out cheaper than the home garden preparation. The name is CoStar WG, manufactured by Certis. The liquid used for home gardening, which I tried first, seemed considerably less effective and cost more. We have several dozen box plants, some of them fairly large. We did two treatments at an interval of a week with the commercial product, after a first treatment with the home garden preparation. DH and I divided the spraying--it wasn't easy: some areas were so steep that I was thinking longingly of climbing harness--taking about five hours for a full treatment of all our box. Currently the box tree moth seems to be MOSTLY under control; I saw only one plant, that DH missed, with living caterpillars, and nothing was completely defoliated, though quite a few plants were hit hard with this spring's infestation. Now that we've had a good rain and I can hope that they'll leaf out again, I can trim back the defoliated young growth. Of course new growth may bring a new infestation, I believe this is going to be a permanent problem. About your idea of talking with Coldiretti about more environmentally friendly ways of dealing with pests--if I understand you; I may not--well, good luck. Two things: first, there is a lot of research going on in Italy about more environmentally friendly ways to farm. I get Coldiretti's regional (Emilia-Romagna) monthly magazine and read parts of it, and there's quite a lot about research with this kind of orientation. Second, from what I see of the local farmers, they tend to be traditionalists, to put it kindly, and not much given to continuing education, attention to research, or concern for the environment. This is purely on the basis of my personal experience and observation, and it's not coming from a person who has an agricultural background. Also agricultural culture may vary from place to place: farmers in your area may be considerably different from those in mine, not to mention that I've had contact with only a few of the local farmers. Even here locally there may be considerable variation in practices and culture. Melissa