Buford--I love the idea of including tree roses in the middle of the upper tier. I actually saw a couple of Frankly Scarlett "18 tree roses this afternoon. They also had a couple of 36" Double Delights. Are there antique tea tree roses? Might be pretty to put a ground cover rose between the tree roses to hang down from the upper tier. brhgm, I saw a Mutabilis today and it had a few blooms on it, very pretty. They had Penelope, too, but it wasn't blooming. Someone else recommended Mutabilis, hmmm. Thanks so much for the ideas! Denise

Well, you have to remember that I am working over lawn grass (compleate with weeds). I don't know what type of native grass you have but I think that you could smother the grass with the newspaper just like I do. Mow it and then lay the newspaper thickly. I use about 6 sheets, you could use more. Some people use cardboard but I never have. By spring, there is no root system left and the soil is loose enought to plant in. I never till. I will be leaving this bed the way it is until spring. Then in the fall, I pull the dead or pretty much dead tomato plants from the old part, bag them and put out for the garbage. Then in the spring I will put pleanty of compost on the entire bed, both old and new parts. No digging, no tilling. I just then plant directly in the compost. And I don't mix the compost in either, I just put it on top. After planting my tomatoes, I mulch them with straw. I find the beds get full of earthworms which break everything down and till the soil to make it nice and loose and easy to work in.

i have an antique brass bed, in a guest room, with the same kind of side rails. i think they might be put in upside down (in the photo) and, therefore, are on the wrong side of the bed. my bed was put together like that by my last mover and was recently discovered by my daughter when she was here visiting. she wasn't able to get the mattress and springs off so just put short boards at the corners to keep them from falling off. i got new carpet since then and i asked the installers to put the rails on correctly when they reassembled the bed. sorry this is so long!..... i don't know if that was done or not and the bedroom is on a different level of the house than i am on and i am in a wheelchair so i can't go check. regarding the length of the mattress, yes, today's mattresses are too long. i bought a used one about 25 years ago, when i bought the bed, since it was shorter than new mattresses at that time. i hope this makes some sense!

So many wonderful responses. Sorry I didn't get back here sooner--got busy and forgot to check. Still don't know what to do, but your individual experiences are very helpful in "educating" me on the topic. I'm thinking perhaps I should call an exterminator. I have breathing problems--COPD--and am on oxygen. Have to carry my portable container around with me as I work in the garden. I hadn't thought about the possibility of getting stung and my breathing being affected. I will try to get a picture of my bees tomorrow (or have my son shoot one)--if the bees will stop moving long enough to snap a pic. Whatever kind of bees they are, they seem to be perpetually in motion flying in and out of the ground hole leading to their hive. The hole, if I remember correctly, was about a 2 inch opening. As to how aggressive they are, I worked fairly close to their ground hive one day--they kept flying over my head--just a few at a time--and then heading back to the ground hive. Then a few more would fly over my head for a minute or so and head back to the ground hive. I thought they were clearly communicating to me that they wanted me to go away (they weren't just being curious about who I was), but when I gently waved them off a couple times, they backed off for a few minutes, but then resumed the circling over my head ("go away, intruder")--so I left before they decided to get mad. The other day I showed the ground hive to my lawn guy, hoping he knew something about bees. He didn't know much. We were standing back about 4-5 feet, and the bees just kept up their usual comings and goings out of the ground hole. Yesterday I moved a bit closer and kind stretched out to get a better look more directly over the hole. That's when I realized there were guard bees just inside the opening. They made an almost instant appearance. I repeated that stretching over the hole about 5 minutes later, and instantly those guard bees showed up. It was about that time that it occurred to me that perhaps I shouldn't push them too much, and I came in the house to research bees on the bee-keeper's forum and then to this forum. I'll try to post some pics tomorrow and then see if anyone has additional advice. I'm pretty sure they are not bumblebees--don't all bumblebees have those darker/black markings, regardless of whether the bumblebee is larger or smaller? Thank you, everyone, for sharing your experiences. Kate