Agreed, Dave. I swear he must have heard me plotting to take out the little bugger 'napping' under my deck. Grrrr.

Purple, I've enjoyed reading this thread and wanted to add my $.02 worth. The first thing I noticed is that the stems appear to be flacid.....wilty. That could be caused by over OR under watering.....whichever might cause the roots from being able to access water. In this case, I wonder if the water you're applying is evacuating before soaking the whole soil volume. One thing about these plants (all plants) is that though they need to dry out somewhat between drenchings, the potting soil must be completely saturated on watering day. This is true for all plants, even those cacti that are native to extremely arid regions. Have you ever seen "Medicine Man ", a movie starring that gorgeous specimen of manhood Sean Connery? It takes place in the rainforest of Brazil. There are scenes of my lovely Sean ziplining through the forest canopy, sharing the scenes with huge epiphytic cacti and other plants. Really neat movie. Plus, it stars Sean Connery. I get that it's difficult to understand how those prickly, barrel shaped desert cacti have ANYTHING to do those graceful rainforest plants. Here's what I "think " is a good analogy, but don't laugh at me toooooo hard if it really stinks. Take your dog into consideration for a moment. It's a mammal. So are you and the pesky squirrels in your yard. Big differences amongst those three mammals yet they share essential similarities. Still with me? Now, think of those incredible bottlenose dolphins familiar to anyone living in coastal areas. Superficially, they seem to have so little in common with your dog, but those porpoises are just another type of mammal. They live in a different environment, for sure, but the similarities are much more important than the differences. You just need to try to provide the kind of environment your dolphin needs. :-) Dorie

Well, I decided to celebrate Ground Hogs Day, even if the pudgy little critter didn't see the shadow we all hope for. Hey, here in MN only 6 more weeks is wonderful! So, how did I celebrate, you ask...... Since this is "the start of the end of winter," I celebrated by LOL shaving my legs! LOL It's amazing what "long-pants season" does for a Minnesota woman!!! Can you think of a better way to acknowlege this day?

We have groundhogs here too, yellow bellied marmots. For years at the research garden outside my office we had Big Mama and her one litter a year. They were adorable and playful. Mama would gather the grass clippings from the little bit of grass outside my office window and didn't bother the plants in the garden. Then two years ago some sheds got moved off the pavement into gravel and with new den sites available, the population exploded, by last summer there were dozens. Live trapping couldn't keep up and eventually we had to resort to Marmot-ageddon. It was sad, because we were fond of (a few) of them. But the poop and smell, gnawed lines under a vehicle ($200) and eventually damage to the plantings meant they had to go. It's been clear but smoggy/foggy here all day, so that means 6 more weeks of winter, which for here, is an early spring. I doubt we'll get it. There's still three feet of beautiful snow on the ground, though it's supposed to warm up a bit next week.