Hi!! new to posting here, but I am sharing your frustration over GSTs. I just ordered 3 more from Shady Oaks, and two bit it by the time I got up this morning. I thought maybe a tiny spider was getting the one itty bitty, but I couldnt see too well, but it may have been another cat I saw balled up over him. Thinking it was a spider, I swatted it away. So I have one lone cat left, just like last time. The last one got really big, and I guess he finally wandered off to pupate. But he sure didnt move much. So I will watch the one ittbitty. I did get some really huge PVSTs. I have never seen one! I really hope they pupate alright. And after being so sad over not getting any BSTs on my very lush fennel, I ordered some along with this order, and presto! new hatched cats! Oh and GF when just hatched look like short little yellow strings. Then they get red. I watch them munching out my kitchen window.The funny thing also is my mom thought I was insane when I started getting into this, so that my then 5 yo son could see the lifecycle, after awhile, and taking her to Shady oaks for the tour, she absolutley loves it too now. This is addictive. They're like my little babies!!--Traci

Merryheart, I was living here in 2002. We moved here in February 1999. What I remember of 2002 was that we had a whole lot of rain in March, April and June and were relatively dry the rest of that year until October or November brought heavy autumn rains. Y'all may have had more rain in Carter County than we had here in 2002. I remember 2004 vividly because we were trying to get the barn/garage built and it rained daily. My dad, who was in the latter stages of Alzheimer's Disease went into a hospice facility in early June and passed away six days later. I was there with him for five of those six days. It rained here every day during that time frame. After daddy passed away, I came home to a wet, soggy, wildly overgrown and weedy garden/yard and trees full of almost-too-ripe peaches. I was playing catch-up for weeks. For what it is worth, we had about 30" of rain here in 2002 and the huge majority of it fell in March, April, June and October. In 2004 we had a little over 40" of rain, with more than 14" of that falling in June alone. The rain in 2004 was especially heavy in April, June, July, October and November, but each month had a pretty decent rainfall amount. I am just guessing, but I think we are on track to have a rainfall year more like 2004 than 2002. One of my peach trees is a Ranger and the other is RedHaven. The guys who were building our barn couldn't get anything done....and they were getting nervous because when they weren't working, they weren't getting paid! They noticed it tended to rain every day during the daylight hours but hardly ever rained at night that summer, so they bought some of those big worklights on stands and started working all night and sleeping during the day. It still took them about twice as long to finish our building as it should have, but that was the fault of the constant rain. Last night we received a weather statement from the NWS that the Red River was going to crest at something like 22.5' and that flood stage near Gainesville/Thackerville is about 25'. So, I think it is up and running about as high as we ever see it around here. I feel sorry for the folks in the Kingston area. Some of them always get flooded when the river is this high. My rainfall totals often vary significantly from the NWS totals and from the OK mesonet station for Love County at Burneyville. Our local cooperative weather service observer lives only a mile or so from us and you would be surprised how much our numbers will vary from his sometimes. That is one of the reason I try to track our rainfall for myself. My early-ripening peach tree is Red Haven and it always ripens around Father's Day, which makes it easy for me to remember when to expect ripe fruit. My other tree is Ranger, and it ripens later than Red Haven but earlier than Loring. According to OSU data, my Red Haven should ripen in early July. However, this tree does as it pleases and always ripens before July arrives. Maybe it is because we are so very far south. Nothing in my garden looks the way it ought to, and nothing is producing the way it usually does. I am hoping for sunshine and heat to correct the problems....if we ever have sunshine and heat again. Just the other day, some of our local firefighters at a meeting I had attended asked me how the garden was doing. I told them that it was pitiful and I was disgusted with it. They were stunned....saying that could not possibly be true. I assured them it was true. I described the garden and how the plants were looking and told them I'd only had about a dozen ripe tomatoes so far. That's when they told me that I was nuts if I wasn't happy with the garden because no one else has had any ripe tomatoes yet, and likely won't for another month. So, I tried to explain to them that usually my garden is 'spectacular' by now but this year it is only average. They basically told me to 'get over it'. LOL So, I guess in comparison to many local gardens, mine is doing fine. However, compared to how it normally does, I still think is it underperforming. I keep telling myself that some years are just this way and you just have to work with the weather you're given. This year's weather is certainly challenging though. I must say the trees love the rain and are growing like mad. We had an additional 2/10s of an inch after I emptied the rain gauge last evening, and both the skies here and the radar indicate it is likely we will receive more rain today. Right now the sun is shining and I bet the mosquitoes are hatching outside. Dawn

OH! Stage_rat-- what timing for this post of yours!! I wish you had been at the Midwest Native Plant Conference in southern Ohio this weekend! You would have learned so much about exactly that (how native plants nurture our wildlife so much more effectively than non-native species)! I have not yet read Douglas w. Tallamy's book, Bringing Nature Home, but am going to pick up a copy ASAP. Here is part of the synopsis from Amazon: "There is an unbreakable link between native plant species and native wildlife ― native insects cannot, or will not, eat alien plants. When native plants disappear, the insects disappear, impoverishing the food source for birds and other animals. In many parts of the world, habitat destruction has been so extensive that local wildlife is in crisis and may be headed toward extinction. "Bringing Nature Home has sparked a national conversation about the link between healthy local ecosystems and human well-being, and the new paperback edition ― with an expanded resource section and updated photos ― will help broaden the movement. By acting on Douglas Tallamy's practical recommendations, everyone can make a difference." You must read this article explaining in detail why cardinals that are eating Amur honeysuckle berries (a food source that is dismayingly widespread now) are not as healthy as the mates they attract think: http://redandthepeanut.blogspot.com/2014/01/a-northern-cardinal-eating-red.html And be sure to follow the link embedded in THIS article to another from the website of the National Wildlife Assn. regarding non-native plants being ecological traps for birds (and, therefore, affecting all wildlife since EVERYTHING is connected to everything else in the Web of Life! And then take a good long look at the plants in your yard to see what you may need to remove and think what you may replace them with!! Another good book with lists of native replacements for horticultural nightmares sold so widely is author Sara Stein's Planting Noah's Garden. It has been out for some time, but has very useful information!

It's been in the low 20's the past few mornings here in South Alabama too... we are supposed to be back in the 70's most of the week with lows back in the 50's. I just hope my amaryllis bulbs will be ok that are in the ground. I got some oak leaves as mulch in my flower beds around my house but the mulch isn't thick. We had some low 20's last year but the bulbs were ok. I cringe when it gets that low here. It doesn't happen often but it does occasionally.