Hi everyone, Well, I am double posting this in 2 forums - I hope nobody minds. As promised, here I am posting about what in the world I've been doing all summer while traveling to & fro Wisconsin. As some of you already know, I work with fish-eating birds: cormorants, pelicans, herons, egrets, gulls, wood storks, etc. My husband and I have been working in Wisconsin for the past 3 years, but we also regularly work in Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, Michigan, Ontario, and a few other places. Yes, we are a husband + wife team, working together out of the same office. Many people are surprised that we work together, but it is great. We make a fantastic team, and are often at our best under challenging field conditions. Great minds think alike, and being dear friends & in love sure helps too. (ok, enough with the mushy stuff). So now for a few photos from the vegetation surveys we did this month. Background: We are working on remote islands in Lake Michigan, around the Door Co. Peninsula area. All the islands have nesting double-crested cormorants and herring gulls. Some also have nesting Am. white pelicans and Canada geese. Back in April, we put up some 6 ft x 6 ft pens (we call them exclosures) to exclude the cormorants because they damage vegetation with their nesting activities (too much POOP!). So then we went back in August to catalog everything that grew in the pens, by plant species, and weighed it to also determine biomass. That meant breaking out the field guides, studying up on botany and the flora of Wisconsin, and bringing the plant presses for species we couldn't identify on the island. We compareed the exclosure plots to some "control" plots, which had nothing but 4 wooden stakes at the corners. We had 45 plots to do on 3 islands, plus another 3 islands down by the city of Green Bay that we did simple vegetation surveys on (no pens). It was alot of work, but very interesting. The bottom line: there are lots of nonnative species on those islands, like motherwort, catnip, pigweed, common mallow, stinging nettle and sow thistle. The native vegetation was primarily lambsquarter and smartweed species. Almost done clipping this 1-meter plot: Looking for small plants beneath the lambsquarter The finished, sampled 1-meter subplot Who would even know what this was?!?! I saved seeds to winter sow and see if I can't figure it out. The very last veg plot to measure. You can tell, because we look so happy! A friend found crawling across the plant press The stinging nettle I hacked through to make us a nice trail to get to the center of the island. At least its not poison ivy! Ok, that's all for now. Have a great evening. Katie (heh - I've been working on this post for days!)

Beck thanks for the Info I thought that they were the seeds but I just wanted to be sure . & TO ALL DO NOT BE AFFRAID TO SEND DUPLICAS Of ANYTHING YOU HAVE :))) we have about 5-6 new members NOw & I know they would love to have what ever we can spare . MRS Santa Has Been Busy this Morning :)) Also For any of you that have a Big Baggie of certain seeds & don't want to take the time to bag each seperately that is fine I will bag them to add to all the players who would like them . I will be sure to put your GW Name on them . I have plenty of hand made seed packet & zip baggies I'm sure . Please include you zone with your information . OK I have been looking Through everyones list & The only ones I'm Haven problems of finding are the Herbs & spices as for the flavored sents apple, lemon ,lime ,pear,orange or veriegated herbs red or purple basil ,stevia, pennyroyal, thyeme 's, Golden oregano , chives, sages anyone into herbs that can tell me where to look ??? Really trying Hard here to fullfill some wishes So if you can help Mrs Claus Here :))) Please Email her :)) well time for me to get into town before the snow fall :( have a great day MRS CLAUSE

We are still adding new swappers and updating lists until the end of the day today, midnight Central time, Sunday, Dec. 9. Post on this thread IF you make changes to your list on your member page! If this thread runs over the 150 post limit before tomorrow, I will start a new one. Otherwise, look for the new thread tomorrow. Morgan, I added your new items to the top of your list. Karen, I copied the list on your member page to the Composite Document. It worked fine! I'll e-mail you tomorrow. In the new thread I am going to offer the plain text copy to anyone who wants it. Lisa (ishareflowers), I've replaced your list with the one that is on your member page at this time. Let me know if there are still problems. It's no trouble to fix them. I'm all caught up to this point, and we have just a couple of people still working on their lists. Sandy, that's a lot of snow! I'm glad you have something you enjoy doing while you are cooped up inside, and we'll all enjoy having seed wishes fulfilled! It's been over two months since the middle of Texas has seen a trace of moisture, so we'd even take a light snowfall at this point! But just a light one. Here is a link that might be useful: COMPOSITE WANT LIST 2012 WLOMWL SWAP

Wow! What a great assortment! The seeds came today & I'm so thriled at the variety. Thanks to you for a lot of hard work & everyone who traded such interesting stuff. Now to inventory & reserch my new friends! Thanks to all & happy gardening!