Cedar rust requires two hosts - anything in the apple family and the cedar family. After the gall from the cedar tree releases it spores, it grows on the apple trees which release their spores to form new cedar galls. I planted three crabapple trees which are supposed to be cedar-rust resistant, they still get a little fungus on them but not enough to really hurt them. CT - I was thinking blue-eyed grass! I don't know what I was thinking but we call that the century plant. I have some too and yes they do reseed easily although I would not call them invasive. I found one growing in our unmowed area with the wild grass. I took them to a plant swap last year at work and one of the swappers brought plants in this year that had seeded from the plant I gave her. Mine are planted on a hot, dry hill and do fine. I have moles too, lots of them! And I love wildlife too but I draw the line at moles and voles. I don't do anything to repel them though, they are just a fact of life for me. A couple of years before the brood X cicada emergence they got huge! The size of large baking potatoes! Which apparently is not unusual, they start eating the nymphs in the last couple of years before the emergence as they work their way to the top. What I hate is when I am working in the garden and all of a sudden earthworms come up out of the ground by the dozens and I can hear the mole digging his tunnel. Luckily as the soil dries out they tend to go deeper and the tunnels aren't as bad. Back to the garden!

So...yesterday, I heard THE mockingbird! The way he changes sounds so quickly, I'm not really thinking he's the mystery bird now. Especially since the mystery bird makes his one sound over and over. Catherine, it's a monotone, for sure. It's usually 2 "teets", separated by a pause, then many "teets" in a row before pausing and starting over. It appears to be speeding up, but now my memory is fading. It's been so long since I've heard it as close to the house as it was the first 2 days. It's a strong sound, not very high pitched, just solid. I have absolutely nothing to compare it to, so I'm sorry for the vague descriptions! As I mentioned earlier, the tempo of the song of the vermilion flycatcher is VERY similar, albeit it's MUCH more high-pitched than the mystery bird's. (I just listened to the song on the Cornell site, and it sounds nothing like the vermilion song in my book - "The repeated territorial song of the male Vermilion Flycatcher!" Ack!) DH did say the bird was a tad smaller than our scrub jays. He said the tail appeared black on the top with "some white underneath"....although trying to view anything against the harsh glare of the sky is NOT very accurate. LOL Thanks for continuing to try, ladies!! The wind is here until Friday, so I may not get another chance to see it until then. :( Brenda

Hey, that's why I love posting here, because I'm definitely NOT a know-it-all. I need backup. :D It all happened so quickly (gliding, landing, sitting pretty), but I really think it had a banded tail with darker colors! I know the chest was white, with brown vertical speckles, if that makes sense. I took the camera out yesterday morning, as I will today, but it didn't show up. There is another bird, though, maybe someone can ID for me. Again, not a very good pic, but it's one of a few birds that have been hanging around. They have a weird flight pattern, where they take off from their perch, swoop out (or up) and around, returning to their perch, almost like a boomerang (or like they're snagging some insects in mid-air?). Anyway, I've mentioned it before as having a light yellow front, and you can just see some peeking out from above the tail in this pic. They usually hang around in pairs, and they're very protective of their "area". This is the one and only time any of them have ventured this close to the house, that I've seen, anyway. It was very hot that day, and it definitely wasn't doing the swoop thing. Maybe someone can help! :) Brenda

"I ahve to say you ladies are REALLY good, maybe we should skip to the first fall warblers???? " Ladies, we are in trouble. Check your Peterson guide on confusing fall warblers to bone up for the challenge! Actually the guide is pretty good by putting them in sub-sections by field marks and color. You can then proceed by process of elimination until you get down to the correct bird. Then check the Cornell's site for other photographs for further positive ID markers. Local variations and light in the photos make if tougher too but if you find most of key ID points it is probably that bird. According to my SMAS group the Blue Jay is considered partially leucistic, not albino, and is exhibiting other feather abnormalities related to genetics. In another communication, Arlene Ripley commented that she has seen many albino birds but none have exhibited the fur-like structures of this Jay's feathers. I did some of my own research on fur-like feathers and every site pointed to something called proto-feathers which were exhibited by some early dinosaurs before true feathers emerged. It's exciting to imagine this bird may be exhibiting an ancient genetic throwback to prehistoric times which upholds the common belief that birds evolved from dinosaurs as they first took flight. There has been a call to ask everyone on the local site if there is a scientic name for this feather anomaly and this call comes from a man that works for the Smithsonian Institute and really knows birds. So far, no reponse, so the local bird community here may be stumped. There was sentiment regarding hope the bird survives. Jean, has this bird been a regular at your feeder for any length of time in which one could make the assumption it has survived nature with this variance? Arlene suggested the photo be posted on websites dedicated to leucistic and albino birds and see if more information could be obtained from readers. PapaSmurf is a rare Blue Jay indeed. CT