Here in NE OK the BFs are in abundance as we are enjoying our Indian summer days. I am having a hard time tearing myself away from the garden and getting anything done inside. "On the 19th of October, my garden gave to me 8 Monarchs fluttering, 10 Orange Sulfurs nectaring, 4 Southern Dogfaces romancing, 1 Dainty Sulfur skittering, 1 Sleepy Orange tasting, 4 Cloudless Sulfurs soaring, 3 Gulf Fritillaries sampling, 2 Variegated Fritillaries sunning, 6 Painted Ladies chasing, 3 Little Yellows timid, 2 Buckeyes flashing, 1 Pipevine investigating, too many Sachems, Fieries, Tawny Edged Skippers, Clouded Skippers to count, numerous Gray Hairstreaks, Eastern Tailed Blues, Pearl Crescents, and 1 Ocola Skipper, all posing on the Golden Crownbeard." Fall is the absolute best here in Oklahoma! Sandy

Like everyone else, I accidentally let my broccoli go this spring and the bees loved the flowers. I felt bad having to eventually cut most of them back but my onions needed the sun. I thought the bees were going to attack me when I was cutting them but they decided to behave. I've found that the 2 best things for bees for me are salvia (those giant black and yellow ones love them) and Thai basil. Both seem to bloom all year but die heinously when the winter freeze comes. I've tried multiple varieties of salvia and the bees seem to like them equally, plus the blooms are striking. Thai basil blooms aren't nearly as spectacular, but the leaves taste like anise, so how can you go wrong with it? Oh wait. I also got a plant from Lukas Nursery whose flower looks like a white butterfly bush and smells like amaretto. No joke. You can smell it from like 30 feet away. It's awesome. I's called sweet almond verbena. Apparently it's hardy down to zone 8a. All I know is that it mocks the coldest nights in Lake Mary and seems to be perpetually in bloom.

Thanks Anna. I still have to get my hibiscus problem under control. As I was pruning them today I saw scale as well as mealy bug stuff. Darn and I thought once I pruned them I would be done...home depot here I come. Oh and John, that picture of ascocenda is frame-worthy, as with many of the pictures here. Love it!

I live about 20 miles east of naples, FL. I keep a journal for various interests and one of the things i've been keeping track of is hummingbird visits to my yard. I counted the number of days I saw HB's in my yard and it came to 188 days in the past year. They have been feeding on firebush plants. These plants bloom constantly except for a 6 to 8 week period in winter. When they are not blooming, I put up a tray type feeder to keep the birds around. I have two types of firebush: hamelia patens and calusa firebush. The hamelia flowers are a yellowish orange and the calusas are bright red. The birds don't seem to have a preference. The only differnce I can see is that the calusa flowers seem to close up during the hottest part of the day. Whenever these plants are blooming, the birds completely ignore the feeder. Right now I have about 20 of these plants in my yard, varying in size from a foot tall to almost 6 feet. I only bought 7 plants , then propagated the rest from seed and cuttings.