THE NIGHTWATCH is a Ben Williams shrub rose that was first offered by Hortico under Williams' Dutch Master Series of striped and streaked roses. I got mine from Hortico, but I see that it is now also listed on Roses Unlimited's website too. I've had mine for about 4-5 yrs, and it's been wonderful. Right now it's about 3 1/2ft high and maybe 5ft wide, due to the arching canes. I have it planted in my "Red/Burgundy/White" bed, along with its fellow striped buddies, MEINDEERT HOBBEMA, REMBRANDT VAN RYN and SCARLET RIPPLE, all Williams roses, and all with no info on parentage. TN waaay overpowers the other roses in the bed, altho RVR is holding its own and trying to keep up. It has a more burgundy/purple color and slightly smaller flowers. It almost looks like a shrubby version of PURPLE TIGER. There are quite a few other roses in the Dutch Master Series. REMBRANDT VAN RYN These pics really aren't as accurate as THE NIGHTWATCH ones. This color is extremely difficult to capture with my camera, and to tweak them to the real color distorts the rest of the picture, so this is the closest I can get. Just envision the color as at least another shade more purple.

Actually we are fat because of the fat fairy. Remember when you put your tooth under the pillow and got a quarter? Or nickel? Well, that winged (^(^((&&*&%$%$ takes the teeth and grows them into fat cells. When you are sleeping happily with all your adult teeth she sneaks in and glues it to your butt and thighs, and anywhere else she can. And uh, I kind of roll around in the dirt too, it sure makes me happy to be all dirty in the garden! Tally Ho!

I live out in the country on 14 acres of mostly forested land and we have barn owls and bats. They seem to peacefully co-exist and I've never seen the owls bother the bats or vice versa. What we do have is two owls that fly together and hunt together. They have been here the entire time we've owned this property--about 8 years now. One is a barn owl and the other is a screech owl. The barn owl always flies from one location to the other. Seconds later the screech owl follows and lands near him/her. The barn owl will hoot. The screech owl will screech. We call them (obviously) Hooty and Screechy. They are ALWAYS together. I don't know if the way they have teamed up together is "normal" or not, but I think it is cute!

Some of you guys underestimate the strength of raptor birds, including the red tailed hawk. I am from Albania and all my life was in contact with birds. I breed canaries, pigeons,chickens,rabbits and other animals. Several times we had to experience episodes involving birds of prey which were a permanent threat to our birds and animals. Once we had a lamb that disappeared and only days later we found parts of the carcass about three kilometers away (about 2 miles). Not far from there was a nest of turkey vultures. We concluded that it was the vultures that had killed the lamb. The lamb weighted about 8-10 kilograms (about 20-24 pound). It was summer time and we knew that it was not a wolf because they never (almost) kill lambs in that time of the year. Now you do the math; the lamb was at least 3-4 times heavier than the vulture. In another episode a hawk took a pigeon almost from my hand; I was holding the pigeon when all of a sudden a hawk was plunging toward me and I released the pigeon because confused and scared. In matter of tenths or hundredths of a second the pigeon was under the hawks claws. Several other times we had pigeons or chickens killed by birds of prey. I am not proud to say it, but I had to kill several hawks over years. I was young and only saw it as a threat and I believed that it was my right to kill them in order to defend my birds. In another occasion we captured a hawk and kept it for several days in a cage. It refused to eat for 4-5 days, and after advice from my father I released it. Anyway, my advice is for all of you who have animals weighting under 10 pounds to not underestimate the strength of birds of prey. They can carry up to 4 times their body weight. Be careful guys