Sandy, A while back the Village Ijots that bought out the Garden Web website were linking advertisements to 'hot words' via intellitxt. So if you used words like "lawn" or "hummingbird" or "seeds" etc in your post it would show up as underlined and if you hovered over it you could see it was a link to another website trying to sell something related to lawns or hummingbirds or whatever. Lots of folks were quite upset and left the forum...others had to download programs to stop it and others like me quit becoming paid subscribers and started to type in blank html codes so the advertisements wouldn't be linked to what we typed. I guess the powers that be realized they were losing members and stopped inserting intellitxt advertising in our posts. ~ Cat

I have been rooting butterfly bushes for several years(i've moved twice) and I never do anything more complicated than sticking the stems in potting soil. I take about a 5" piece, strip all but the top two sets of leaves, and plunk it in a 4" pot of pot. soil. If it is a bit flimsy, I'll poke a hole with a stick first. I keep the soil moist and pinch out any flowers that try to come for a few months. Looking back in my gardening journal, in 2005 I took 4 cuttings from my blue and 6 from my white on June 23rd and had visible roots at the bottom of the pot on July 11th. I've done this with abelia, spirea, gardenia, oakleaf hydrangea, and hardy verbenas. I'll repot them in progressively larger pots once or twice and then in the ground they go. Mere

Hey Annie, Thank you for the compliments, just got done looking are your roses and I would have to say the same! I got the carnations at Lowes I think a few years ago. I love them! They are my birthday flower and I was so excited to find them as I didn't think they would do well down here but then again those places tend to buy things that don't do well for the area. Turns out they have done wonderfully. I do remember you telling me about your daughter living in Columbia and your someday visit down here which I am still looking forward to! :O) Yes, it is too bad she doesn't live closer as I would love to help her out. Mabe when you do end up coming to visit her we can all meet up at the zoo. Then you could come down to visit Charleston. I have a membership to Magnolia Garden and Plantation and I could show you around there and have a picnic there perhaps, I love it there. Maybe you could bring your daughter too and we could have a nice time. July and August are hot and humid though so be prepared. So far it really hasn't been too bad heat wise. We have actually had a nice long cool spring with a few hot days lately but not too bad. Looking forward to your visit! Congratulations grandma! ~Meghan

Saw the first of the yellow Sulfurs two days ago. I was trying to film my pursuit of a big White Tiger Swallowtail and some of the deep orange Copperpots when one yellow Sulfur went zipping by me. All you can see on the video is something yellow flittering fast across the screen. Soon they will be thick in the garden air just above the plants. Their favorite plants are the stinky Salvias. They always appear in mid-to-late summer in clouds of yellow all over the Lady-in-Red Salvias. They seem to like Bright Lights Cosmos too. Thanks Annette. Sorry you don't have them to enjoy. Wonder why? ~Annie