Leslie, Yay! Planting time is my favorite time of the year, or at least it is until harvest time replaces it as my favorite time. Have you reached your average last frost date yet? I know it must be getting close. My average last frost date is tomorrow, and I may celebrate that date by putting corn seed in the ground so we'll have Early Sunglow corn to harvest by Memorial Day weekend. Well, assuming pests, tornadoes, hail, flash flooding, wildfire or some other natural disaster don't get the corn plants before the corn gets harvested. On nights our forecast low is in the low 40s, I usually worry a little about the tomato plants but don't cover them up. If it is forecast for the upper 30s I do cover them. Around here, a forecast low of 38 or 39 usually gives us an actual low near freezing accompanied by frost. I just finally got around to potting up sweet pepper plants yesterday and they really won't even be large enough to put in the ground for another 2 or 3 weeks. I started hot pepper seeds very late, so they likely won't be big enough to transplant outside until latest April or early May. I am not rushing to get beans, squash or anything else into the ground....at least not for another week or two. At our house, we really have reached "dead week", which is the quiet week or two in between the point where all the cool-season crops are planted and it is still too cold/too early to plant the warm-season crops. Well, except for tomatoes....but they always get special handling here. I use dead week to work on larger projects....like planting flowers or cleaning up and mulching perennial/shrub beds, or starting seeds of warm-season flowers in the greenhouse. It is kind of drizzly here this morning, although I think the afternoon will be a lot warmer, sunnier and nicer. It might be a good afternoon to garden, but I won't be out there in the garden because I have to be someplace else. I hope to spend all day out in the garden tomorrow though. The flower border needs weeding, mulching and some pruning back of last year's dormant foilage on some of the perennials. The tomato plants that already are in the ground sure do look happy. Even though we didn't get much rain, the rain water always seems to perk them up and make them happy. The smaller tomato transplants grown from seed are in the greenhouse today to keep them out of the wind. If the wind has dropped significantly by the time I make it back home from a funeral this afternoon, I might carry the tomato seedlings outside to the patio for a couple of hours of sunlight and wind exposure. Dawn

Rebecca, I think the potatoes would be okay either way. The fact that yours aren't dying back tells me they likely haven't made very many tubers yet, because the tubers would signal a degree of maturity that would cause the plants to die back. Normally. It is just that nothing is normal this year, so I don't know what the heck is going on with your potatoes. I have had potatoes in the ground last into July some years without dying back, and I got tired of waiting for them, had succession crops I wanted to plant and I just went and dug them up anyway and had a fine crop. I do think those also were very hot years, and I remember the potatoes were in the ground and not in the newish raised beds where I grow them now, so it had to be before voles found the front garden. I hope you have a nice time in Fort Worth, and yes, the heat likely will drive you into the pool daily...there's nothing wrong with that either. Amy, I thought you gave fine advice when I read that thread yesterday and really had nothing to add, so I didn't comment. One day there was good rain south of us. I think the very next day there was good rain north of us. Another day it was east of us. I feel like the rain never is going to actually hit us....it just skirts around us all the time. So frustrating. At least for the next 7 days I don't have to get my hopes up because the 7-day QPF shows us getting nothing. Jersey always tore the stuffing out of everything. Now she's down to only tearing it out of stuffed toys she gets in a stocking at Christmas. She had torn the stuffing out of her bed repeatedly and I would unzip the cover, stuff all the stuffing back in, sew up the little holes she pulled stuff through, etc. She had a lumpy dog bed but it was all her fault. Then we bought new dog beds for her and Jet a couple of years ago and she got to sleep on a non-lumpy dog bed again. She liked it. She hasn't torn any of the stuffing out of this new dog bed, so either she finally grew up (she's 11.5 years old now) or she discovered that an intact dog bed was more comfortable than a shredded one. Nancy, I bought a cheap $4 or $5 mini-blind at Wal-Mart the last time I needed new plant labels too because we no longer have mini-blinds in our house. We replaced them with wood blinds with 2" slats several years ago and I guess I finally ran out of all the old ones I saved to cut up for blinds. Or, someday I'll find a pile of old mini-blinds in the garage stashed away in some out of the way spot. Even buying a new blind is a lot cheaper than buying real plastic plant labels in those little packages sold near the seed racks. You get a ton more plant labels for about the same amount of money. Things are frying. The heat is so awful. Sometimes I look at the plants and say to myself 'why do y'all look so bad'. Then I realize they have had above-average heat and below average rainfall for 2 months now, and it all makes sense to me. I probably should be surprised that they don't look worse. There's lot of caterpillars hitting flowering plants hard right now. The ones you're seeing could be the larvae of silvery checkerspot or bordered patch butterflies. Sharon, I'm sorry about your squirrel troubles. It seems like so very many people are having squirrel trouble the last 2 or 3 years. I bet there was a huge squirrel population explosion during the wet years of 2015-1026 and the relatively wet year (for much of OK) of 2017, and now everyone is saddled with those squirrrels, their children and their children's children. I'm not sure what it takes for their population to cycle down again. Out here in the rural areas it cycles up and down because there are predators to help control them. There in town where so many of y'all live, I doubt you have enough predators, except perhaps for people who have an energetic dog out in the yard, so once the squirrel population goes up, I expect it takes it a long time and a couple of consecutive drought years to help the population cycle back down again. I hope you get something edible out of your garden than the squirrels do not steal and devour. I keep looking at our dry cracking ground and wondering why I try to keep the garden green and in bloom. I guess it is because I can. Not just for us, but for all the bees, butterflies, moths, hummingbirds, wild birds, turtles, skinks, frogs, etc. At least as long as the garden is green, all these little creatures and many more have a habitat that is green and producing food for them. There's cardinals in the garden all the time. If I sit still they come pretty close to me. I think they are eating grasshoppers and other pests. There's also hummingbirds all the time. There's many flowers in there for them, plus a hummingbird feeder, and tons of little insects for them to eat. I have greatly upset Mr. Turtle by removing the squash plants. The bumble bees weren't happy either, but there's tons of other flowers in there that they like, including catip and comfrey. Mr. Turtle liked to live under the squash plants and eat squash bugs. Now that I've removed the squash plants, he headed over to the area with southern peas, zinnias and sunflowers, but he comes back every few hours to check the former squash bed for squash bugs. Perhaps he is living in the shade beneath the sunflowers while he searches for other kinds of insects to eat. So, for the sake of all those creatures, I'll keep watering the garden at least once a week for as long as I can keep it alive. Sometimes the early August weather defeats me anyhow. The point where I usually give up and stop watering is when our Keetch Byram Drought Index hits around 600. While the KBDI applies to firefighting, I have tracked it for so long at the same time that I am trying to keep my garden happy in the hot, dry months that I know what it means for my garden when the KBDI hits different points. At 600 and higher, I can keep the garden alive, but it is very hard to keep it producing. At 700, forget the veggie garden....I'd better be watering all the trees and shrubs in the yard, no matter how well-established and old they are. But, when we are in the 600s, it is like the moisture from irrigation can only help the garden up to a certain point and I know that. I do, I do, I do, truly I do. So, often, I will stop watering once it hits 600. Now, this is where it gets complicated.....or it is the point where my brain spaced out and has been out to lunch for the last couple of weeks. Our KBDI was in the 500s and going up about 11 to 13 points daily before the rainfall in early July, and that rain knocked it back down into the upper 300s. So, every time I look at our KBDI number on the map now I sort of rejoice because it still is so much better than it was. Even though I know we got a lot less rain at our house than the mesonet station did and even though I know that our KBDI still would be a lot higher than the Mesonet station's official number for our county, I still feel better seeing that lower number (now back up to 492, I think). I guess I have been spaced out or in denial. Last night after dinner when I sat down to the computer and looked at the KBDI map, I abruptly awakened from whatever coma my brain has been in since the July 1st (or whenever it was) rainfall and realized that the KBDI map still shows color---so if your area of your county is at a different drought stage than your Mesonet station reflects, the color in your part of the county shows that by being the color of whatever KBDI stage your area is in. Where has my brain been? Was it on vacation? Out to lunch? Our part of the county is red, so our KBDI here, even if not defined by numbers, is in the 600-700 range. Well, crap, crap, crap. That explains why the zinnias wilt daily, even though there is some moisture in their soil. It explains why the pepper plants look like crap 24/7 even though they also aren't bone dry. It explains so much....the huge and sudden explosion in the population of spider mites (their reproductive cycle speeds up when it is hot and dry, and they become a huge problem on drought-stressed plants). It even explains why the watermelons look great---they love it hot and dry! Even though my garden gets watered and looks green compared to the rest of the surrounding area, it still is heat-stressed, drought-stressed and in an area with a KBDI above 600. I know that this means----it means I should just give up and stop watering. Let it go. Let the annuals die. Let the perennials get right to the edge of death, and then water them just enough to pull them back into the land of the living. I don't know what I am going to do. (sigh) I even told Tim that we are in the higher KBDI category and that I am not going to accomplish much with the irrigation except just sort of keep the plants barely hanging on. I don't want to stop watering. I don't. Even though I know it would be the sensible thing to do. A couple of times this week, the chairman of our county fire board has sent out communications about fires and how this year's second fire season is about to begin or perhaps already is underway. I tried to ignore their content, tried to push it out of my mind, tried to tell myself that things aren't that bad yet. Well, after looking at the KBDI map, I guess things are that bad, and it shows in my poor hot, tired, dry garden.....that isn't really dry because I water it well, but it is too dry, if you know what I mean. On the bright side, I don't have to blame myself or the plants for how bad they look. They look bad because the conditions are bad, not because I am not doing my best to give them water, mulch and weeding. (At least with fewer weeds, there's less competition for the moisture I give them.) I don't want to pull the trigger and stop watering. I want all the wee little wildlife to have a green sanctuary from the heat. So, I'll keep watering for another week or two. I'll shade the plants I can with shadecloth. I'll add more mulch to try to keep the ground cooler and more moist. And, I'll hope all those efforts aren't for naught. I keep telling myself we're midway through the summer months now. I've kept the garden going this far, and I can get it all the way through to autumn if I try, but even though I say those words to myself, I'm not even sure I believe them. I just hate this weather. Fun stuff is still happening. I've been seeing a doe with two fawns at the compost pile and adjacent deer feeding area every evening around 5 pm, so I put out sliced summer squash and zucchini for them along with some deer corn. The fawns are super tiny and so cute. It is like watching little puppies frolic, play and eat. Well, this morning she brought 3 tiny fawns. I thought she had twins because she's been bringing only 2. I doubt she had triplets because why would she have been bringing only 2 to eat? Maybe she is bringing another doe's fawn, or maybe she has picked up an orphan and is raising it with her two. Either way, seeing three tiny fawns eating is the best part of the day. This morning I gave them thinly sliced watermelon. It was like watching human children have watermelon---they were so delighted! That made me so happy. Dawn

Aaaackk! I'm so far behind I don't know how I can catch up, but I'll try. And, technically, this is a new month and a new week but I want to finish this thread before I start the new one. Bruce, It definitely is encroachment of a major type. Frisco and all the surrounding areas have grown, and continue to grow, exponentially. We drive down some of the roads mentioned in the coyote area occasionally, and they were country roads not too long ago and are city roads now. The development is occurring at such a breakneck pace that one of the things I tend to say to Tim every time we drive through there is ""where's all the wildlife being pushed away into?....what's left for them now?" Amy, It is alright. You've been through a lot recently and I am sure you have a lot on your mind. Now that you've found this thread, I'll go start the new one for this week in a few minutes. Regarding the chickens? We've had ferrets, weasels and ringtailed cats all get into coops we thought were secure, so maybe you have one or more of those sneaky beasties around? The first two, in particular, can squeeze through fences and through tiny openings. Congrats on the contract on your dad's condo. That happened fairly quickly all things considered. I know you'll be glad when you can cross the condo off your list of things you have to worry about. Nancy, The beautiful weather sounds nice. All too soon it will be icky again, either cold or snowy or windy or icy or some combination thereof. Today was only 56 degrees so warm but neither too hot or cold. All the wind the last two or three days brought down most of the leaves left on the trees, so we look really wintery now and even the last remaining red oaks in the neighborhood have lost their red and gone brown or naked now. It definitely looks wintery and I sure miss the green foliage. Fruitcake is an acquired taste. My dad made it as did several of my uncles, but I never acquired a taste for it. Early in our marriage I made one. I have no idea why. I wonder what I was thinking? Maybe I thought that making a Christmas fruitcake was a southern/family tradition I should carry on into my adult life? Nope, nope, nope. It wasn't worth the bother, we didn't even eat it, and I never made one again. If I wanted a fruit cake (and I don't) I'd order this one from Corsicana's Collin Streat bakery that ships tons of them annually: Deluxe Fruitcake A lot of people in Texas, in particular, consider this the ideal fruitcake, perhaps because a lot of it is not fruit---it is pecans. They sell about 3 million pounds of fruitcakes per year (mostly at this time of the year) and ship to at least 195 countries, in addition to the USA. In this particular case, even though I love to bake, I feel like they make a much better fruitcake than I ever could or would or have. Rebecca, I am not even sure my dad and his family members really liked fruitcake, but I guess it was a tradition from their relatively poor youth so they kept making it and eating it....despite not really liking it. I think maybe it is because their parents loved it and they lost their parents really young, so perhaps they clung to the fruitcake tradition as a way of hanging on to their memories of their parents. Larry, It is really kind of you to provide some entertainment for the cows. I know there must be some really good fruitcakes, but most of the ones I've eaten would not have been labeled as good in any shape, form or fashion, which is a shame considering how much work goes into making one. It also is tiring to try to chase down all the ingredients. I've noticed the last two or three years that a lot of the candied fruit type stuff that goes into them isn't even sold in local stores any more. Kim, I bought the Whole Seed Catalog at Sam's Club the first couple of years but it wasn't that special, other than just for reading it to pass the time, and I stopped spending money on it. Jen, I don't know of any way to tell the good seeds from the bad ones when they all look the same at the time you harvest and dry them. About the only thing you could do would be to run a germination test by sowing 10 or 20 of them on a wet paper towel or coffee filter and putting it in a ziplock bag. Check daily to see how many germinate. That at least would give you an idea of what percentage of the seeds you've saved will be viable. Keep in mind if the original plants were hybrids, their offpsring likely will not come true from saved seed. Jennifer, I hope your long day on Saturday went well and that you've spent today resting and recovering. Amy, I was watching the weather when the tornadoes spun up and was horrified when they started issuing Tornado Warnings for a "Particularly Dangerous Situation" type tornado emergency. It looks like it was horrible in the areas hit, but also seems like injuries were minimal and no one died. Why can't we have normal weather here? Tornadoes at the end of November are not unheard of but also not terribly common. We had some very strong wind gusts (likely in the 50s) as our severe tstorms roared through, but no real damage here. Some people in our county had portable structures, like sheds and carports, flipped or destroyed and trees damaged and power lines down and such, but I think it all was straight line wind damage and no twisties here. We got less that 0.20" of rain out of it, but I'm so relieved to not have mud any more that I'm not complaining. Rebecca, I hope y'all found a Christmas tree that was up to your standards. We bought a terrific and beautiful pre-lit one several years ago and I love it. I believe we got it at Lowe's. When I looked at the trees they have this year, none of them were anywhere close to it in quality though. It seems like everything we buy anymore just keeps being made more and more cheaply, although prices continue to go up. We had the girls this weekend and had lots of holiday fun, but I am exhausted and ready for the new week so I can catch up on my rest a little bit, Good-bye November! Dawn

Drove down to the cabin today and my Duranta is putting on side branches on the main trunks as well as more blooms. I was pleased to see those two developments. That means it likes the soil just fine, provided it gets enough water. I also planted two Delaware Valley (white) azaleas at the end of the front porch. Transplanted two climbing roses along the fence as well: Fourth of July and Dr. Huey, both I will train horizontally onto the fence. I've seen photos of both of those roses trained onto chain-link fence recently and they do quite nicely on fences with a few soft tie downs to keep the long branches horizontal. I use strips of old pantyhose to tie plants down. It stretches as they grow and never cuts into the skin/bark. Here in Temple, the Dr. Huey was planted in the middle of an area I was transforming into a potting station; the Fourth of July was planted in total shade and rarely blooming without sunlight. Now they are planted in full sun and should live happily ever after. :) I'll be sure to post photos when they are fully leaved out again and blooming.