I live in the city and bought a butterfly bush last year. To my amazement, a butterfly joined us for a whole day in our garden! I grew up in the suburbs, so figured I would never see butterflies in a city! Got hooked quicker then a worm on a hook in a fish farm! This year, I have more butterfly loving plants, but most haven't started blooming yet. (Butterfly bush, Russian Sage and lavender seems to keep them happy.) This year, I've seen a huge variety, often all at once. Now, I'm not you, so can't tell you what any of them are. (Did research last year's visitor, which also fueled my addiction, since I never noticed any butterflies that weren't monarchs until then.) So, what can such a novice teach you about what I've learned? In the mid-Atlantic states, last year was a crappy year for vegetable gardeners, particularly tomato lovers. I don't know too many gardeners around here, but the two that I do know (one 50 miles away, the other 75 miles away) are both very knowledgable about how to garden, and yet I (I've had to read excessively to stop having what felt like a permenent brown thumb LOL) was the only one, who managed to get any tomatoes at all last year. It was so bad, even the news reported it, and commericial growers were in bad shpae. (I live in Philly. The commerical growers are mostly in South Jersey and one of the main reason its nickname is "The Garden State.") They had plants of course, but little grew for them. Why? The spring of 2006 was extremely wet around here -- flash floods, flooding in towns that only get any flooding about once ever 100 years, and it just seemed to rain forever! This spring was perfect -- rained enough, and only had a flooding problem once for areas proned to flood. I had the same three plants that are flowering now, in bloom last year, but only saw one beautiful butterfly then. It might just be a reaction to your incredibly wet spring. Unfortunately, it might be foreboding about your garden in general this year, too. At least my story will let you know, if it is a bad butterfly season this year -- it doesn't mean the end of butterflies for your area, just lower numbers this year. BTW, you grow butterflies inside?! Might sound like a strange comment to write in a butterfly forum, but this is my first visit, so, ...how cool!!! And your knowledge? I'm so impressed!!! Thanks for sharing!

Still nothing, Robert. I'll admit I'm a little disappointed, but my expectations were probably too high. All we have blooming is redbud and dogwood. In two more weeks I'll have red columbine and red honeysuckle, heuchera and maybe other things. Even so, they're so tiny and quick they're hard to see. They could easily be out there and not used to my feeder yet (wasn't out there this time last year). Can't watch every minute, and they're hard to see unless they're chasing each other around. Last year that's the first thing that I noticed-- all those high speed chases. I'm not giving up yet. This time of year it's cool enough so I only have to change the feeders every 6 days--no work at all. Pretty soon there'll be a mama with babies to feed and I want to be there to get them if they're willing. The books say they remember where they found food the year before, so if you get a bunch of hungry babies this year, next year you'll have a lot of grown up birds coming. (The books again :) The books say a new batch of hatchlings eats for a few days then the mother chases them off (that way siblings don't mate). Then the little new guys are lowest on the pecking order and have to find a new place to eat. If we miss them now, we may catch them then. So I'm going to wait for that little hungry guy that is too hungry to be picky :) With all the hummingbird plants you've been putting in, you're bound to have some that chance on you and then hang around.

Tisha, I can't imagine why they haven't found your yard. Have you asked your neighbors if anyone ever has any hummers? It seems if they are around the neighborhood, they'd stumble across your yard at some point, especially since you have feeders out. They do eat insects, and feed the insects to their young as well, so if you happen to live in a neighborhood where a lot of people regularly use pesticides, or where the city or county routinely sprays for mosquitoes, that could be impeding your insect population which might cause the hummers to go elsewhere looking for the insects they need. We have had a whole lot of hummers here in Love County--many more than usual. I'm not seeing as many right now, but that is probably because they are hatching and caring for their young. Once the little ones begin to fly, it gets busy again. I still see them, but just not as often as I was about 3 weeks ago. The times I am most likely to see them are early in the morning, shortly after sunup, and then in the evening, not too long before sunset. I guess they are coming to the feeders for breakfast and dinner, but apparently not for lunch. Sometimes I put up a patio mister for them and they come and either play in the mist or bathe in it. A sprinkler also will attract them. Don't give up. Keep the feeders out and keep your eyes open. I think they'll find you sooner or later. Dawn

Thanks Embothrium. Where are you located? We've lived here in central Indiana for 35 years, and this is the first I saw one. Just a couple weeks ago, we saw a bald eagle here for the first time too.