I've never raised either one of them myself, Susan, but nessus sphinxes have come to my garden, and they're adorable! Since you've already raised eumorphas, I hope they're nessus cats. Keep us posted! MissSherry

Oh good grief... look at this recipe I found on ifood.tv: Ingredients: Cantaloupe - 2 (Firm Under Ripe) Cider vinegar - 1 Cup (16 tbs) Water - 1 Cup (16 tbs) Brown sugar - 1âÂÂ2 Pound (About 1 1/3 Cups, Packed) Sugar - 1âÂÂ2 Cup (8 tbs) Whole cloves - 10 Cinnamon stick - 3 Inch , broken into small pieces Whole mace - 1âÂÂ2 Teaspoon Directions: Remove rind and seeds and cut cantaloupe into 1-inch cubes. (There should be about 2 quarts cubes.) Put cubes into a bowl; cover with a salt solution (2 tablespoons salt dissolved in 1 quart icy cold water). Invert a plate over fruit to keep cubes submerged in solution. Set aside 2 hours, then drain thoroughly. Combine the vinegar, water, sugars, and the spices in a large heavy saucepan. Bring to boiling and add the drained melon. Cook, uncovered, over medium heat until cubes are almost transparent, stirring occasionally. Using a slotted spoon, remove cantaloupe to hot sterilized jars and pour the hot syrup over them. Remove air bubbles and add more syrup, if needed, to fill jars to within 1/2 inch of top **** That's it. No directions on what to do once you've filled the jars. So... wonder how many folks just filled jars and let them sit?!? I would imagine even refrigerated they would not keep for long with no processing, correct? I mean, it's got sort of the right ration of 1:1 water to vinegar, but... would you process this? If so, BWB or PC? For how long? WHY don't they have people who know what's safe and what's not look at these before they post them? (I know, preaching to the choir here, but I just had to vent a little.) Edie

Solanaceae: thank you, my trellis is 7' high. Last year my plants went 9' then over the neighbor's fence and down into his yard. Yes, I have removed any foliage touching the ground on all plants thus far. Plant 'ropes' are a neat idea, thank you! Gardener: it was your post that prompted me to think hard about what I was doing, especially since Carolyn's response. Dave #1: My gosh?!?!? you remember from last year? I'm impressed!!! Actually, they grow against a 7' trellis that is 3' away from the neighbor's fence. I made the mater bed twice as large this year, but also planted twice as much (they were so small when I put them in!). No real huge problems yet (touch wood) other than some early season critter damage, a droopy yet producing banana legs and some weird bronzyness on some leaves that I sprayed.... but plants are a bloomin' and looking good.... a little too good actually. This is basically what I've been doing.... had plenty of early branches that suffered sunburn and early old leaves that just yellowed w/ age. Those are gone. Everything touching the ground has been going too. But these babies are beginning to sprawl big time. Good, thank you, its the large lower suckers that I let go last year and gave me tons of trouble. Even though some are tempting to leave as they look as they might flower, I want to remove them. I have plenty of space to go up, and plenty of room for plants to grow out (forward) just not left to right, know what I mean? Thank you for the note to take it slow and go in phases... after my experience last year (removing practically half the plant due to disease and still having it overtake the yard) I'm tending to leap to the shears pretty quick. thank you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and thank you for the link, I'd actually just stumbled across that myself about 3 weeks ago when blossoms started happening. Dave #2: thank you too!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ok, so I kinda messed up re the det. vs indet and the reading you just posted for me helped me immensely.... Last year, I bought all my plants from the local home stores. I trusted what I was told on the little labels. Last year I had a gazillion romas, and they appeared to grow indet. (up like a vine, not bushy at all) This year, the hubby wanted 'plenty of romas, plant plenty of romas' ... soooo, having ws'd everything, I sowed a bunch o romas and planted them. All my det.'s went into a new bed this year, as I just wanted to let them sprawl and see what happened, and all of my heirloom indet.'s went into last year's bed.... thinking they'd grow skywards like last year ... except for romas, I planted them thinking they were indet.'s. Your link, and item #2 on that page just cleared a lot up for me. Romas are det.'s huh? Now this is making sense. Idiot me, I didn't read the seed packet. I'm sure it must say det. on there. Really I am way over crowded, but the romas are completely and utterly out of control, growing fat and bushy and low to the ground, like green octopus all over the place... not at all what the generic 'romas' I had last year do. I expected a relatively repeat performance to what I got last year, and this year its completely different. Well, one roma is threatening my Paul Robeson, and another one is creeping onto a Black Krim, and I just can't have that kind of nonsense, so some Roma's got to go.... Thank you so much for the tip on slowly removing just some troublesome branches on the det's. Really, thank you for everything.... you have the patience to answer the same questions over and over, year after year... : ) Everyone here is tremendous and I really appreciate it.

Lance, this is why the highway department chooses crepe myrtle to plant in the medians. Cars can run them down and the crepe will grow back up from the roots. I had one that I had mechanically ground down to a foot below the soil surface and three years later it came back up. Bite the bullet, get some cold beer and call over your buddies to dig it out. It's too close to the house and the leaves (deciduous) are going to fill the gutters. Move the iris first to someplace they won't get deeper buried by the annual application of bark chips.