I am interested in your coneflowers and flox. Please look at my trade list - I have hostas and pachysandra ( a great shade area ground cover) email me if you would like to trade! Thanks! :0)

I have two patches of the plain old red Bee Balm, Monarda didyma. One spot is drier and sunnier than the other, and that patch isn't doing very well. This Spring I'm going to transplant it to the backyard, where the soil is richer and not so dry. This plant is the #1 Hummingbird plant in my yard right now, although I'm planting a bunch of others they like this year, like Cardinal flower and Cypress vine, so we'll see. Monarda fistulosa is supposed to do better under drier conditions. I have the cultivar 'Claire Grace', planted last Spring, that is doing well in a dry spot, part sun. It's got lots of little shoots coming up. I am winter-sowing Agastache rupestris and a couple other Agastaches this year. They supposedly attract hummingbirds like crazy and are very drought-tolerant. I think they actually MUST have well-drained conditions, or there's no chance of them thriving or surviving the winter. You might want to check out Ipomopsis rubra - a tall native with red tubular flowers that also attracts hummingbirds and grows under very dry, sunny conditions. It's a little weedy in appearance, but pretty flowers -I plan to add it to my wildflower meadow...maybe next year.

Susan, I love your light stand and always will love it. I realize it was the best solution for you, but if I told Tim I wanted to buy one of those, he'd hand me a hammer and tell me to build my own....which is why I have the one that I have. : ) Mine is hidden away out of sight in a room where guests rarely venture, although anyone who knows me and who knows I raise my own seedlings always asks to go upstairs and see it in the spring. So much for putting it out of sight....I just should have set it up in the dining room or breakfast room or something.... I am sure you'll be deliriously happy with it and will have many wonder seed-starting adventures and I look forward to hearing all about them. I think you got a great deal considering it was Gardener's Supply. I never buy anything of theirs for full price. They have sales often enough (and especially in November when, I think, some of us gardeners are shopping for ourselves) that a person can be patient and get a good price during their periodic sales. I've noticed that prices often are not as good in December when gardeners' spouses or family members are doing what I call "panic Christmas buying" and cannot afford, time-wise, to wait for a sale. I don't think you were repetitive at all. The more we all share about what we do, how we do it and why we do it (as well as pointing out what didn't work for us!), the better for all of us to learn from one another's experiences! Carol, Our weather is just like yours. Our high was 70 degrees yesterday and it was so gorgeous outside I could hardly stand it. I wanted to jump up and down and scream "Spring Is Here!". That was exacerbated by the smell of the orange blossoms on my little orange tree. However, I controlled myself because I knew it was a false spring and that winter was returning today. It was 56 degrees around 7 a.m. here at our house and now it is 36 degrees and we have had very, very light rain but lots of thunder. Phooey on winter! I think you showed those folks at the co-op that one benefit of being a gardener is that it keeps your muscles and joints strong, healthy and fit. I'd rather "work out" in the garden any day, than walk on the treadmill or work out on the weight machine. Who wouldn't? Trees, Nope, sorry, I just haven't gotten to it. I am trying. Watch for it in a couple of hours or in the morning. I'm about to start typing mow after I close up the chicken coops, put out the deer corn for my favorite deer, refill the bird feeders (those little birdies are eating nonstop today trying to stay warm), etc. I'm kind of dreading going out into the cold wind but I need to do it now before it gets dark. I have to warn you that I don't use the same planting schemes every year because I don't want to get stuck in a rut, but I'll try to mention some of the planting schemes in my usual rotation. Dawn

They didn't have a phone number, so didn't get any information so will just take a run out there in the morning to see what it's all about. I did print out their list of available plants and trees, definitely stuff you don't see at Home Depot or Lowe's!