Daniella wins, lol. That is the big toad that jumped on my foot last week. I found his daytime hiding spot in that pot with the dead leaves buried in the epi, lol. I will take more pics of it. The buds are still swelling but it may open tonight. Something was chewing on some of the leaves, maybe snails but I'll take a pic of the whole thing and some more of the buds. I saw some smaller green things on one of the plants. I guess they are cicada. Do they eat bugs or plants? I believe the squash is an edible goard of some sort. I know its edible because we eat them every year and love them, lol. I just can't find out what they are. These haven't gotten as big as normal. They are usually really big by now so I decided to harvest them and hope it makes more. I hope I didn't mess up and lose my chances of getting new seeds. I usually let the last one of the season grow really big until the plant dies but last year the deer ate it and I didn't get new seeds and the old ones aren't germinating well. I only got one plant out of about 20 seeds I have tried to grow. I have 6 more trying one last time before it gets too late.

Hi, those are really nice photo's, is it the first time that your banana has bloomed? I just have a few very pampered tropical plants. I have three Tamarillo trees in some 5 gal. buckets one of them is blooming for the first time in two years, so far there is no fruits. I also have some white flowering gingers and a 19 year old white flowering Epi, that I have to cut back each year as it just gets way to big to handle. I also have a 17 year old dragon palm which isn't a palm at all, but is a very nice plant. This year I planted it in a 30 gal. container, boy will I have a hard time this fall when everything has to come into my small duplex. Well keep it up your tropical garden looks great. George W. Z5-6 Mo.

It is almost identical to the ones we have in the UK, (Hover flies) so called because they can hover in one spot like a humming bird- abd sort of dart about and hover then dart again a few inches, Actually some of the hover flies we have will pollinate your tomato flowers if they are in a greenhouse, and a few get into the greenhouse and very quickly pollinate and hover very close to the flowers-the mere action of their wing beats is enough to do the job.

I'll give a taste report on the Alphonso when I eat it. As far as all of the mangos on our family's trees (Kent, Keitt, etc.), between family members, friends, and dehydrating them, we use them all! I saw the Valencia Pride owner on a very tall ladder with an extended picker a couple of days ago. She got most of them except for the upper 1/3 of the tree.