This is a great thread, and at a time I have been thinking how nice it is to have all this nature thriving just outside my door. I have: LIZARDS - many varieties in the garden. TOADS - (I've never seen a "frog" here, just lots of toads). SQUIRRELS - Almost every day I see one sitting in the bird feeder eating sunflower seeds. BIRDS - Mostly cardinals, doves, & Carolina wrens. A family of Carolina wrens live in a birdhouse behind my Austin rose, 'Heritage'. I can see both the mom & the dad feeding their babies from the window. For some reason our cat, normally a fierce hunter, just sits and watches them. She could have easily eaten all of them long ago, but she chooses to coexist with that particular bird family in our backyard. ARMADILLOS - I'm not so happy about these. They live in the woods one block away and visit the garden during the night. Each morning, I have to do damage control from their drunken parties they throw each night. Plants half-dug up, rose roots exposed to the air, big holes everywhere, their beer bottles strewn about. They will continue to visit me until this fall when there will be sufficient rain to enhance the earthworm hunting in their woods. Until then, they will go where there is regular irrigation. BUTTERFLIES - I think the penta plants, summer phlox, & alyssum bring them in. Happy weekend, Randy

Very exciting - so glad you got to see it today! Our first nest last year, we got to see them fledge then. Ours fledged today around noon, but I was on a web-conference, and missed it. We DID however, witness the ensuing chaos in the backyard with two adults trying to track / wrangle five directionless young around in the woods. We'll put mealworms out again this evening. Last year it was a few days, but they eventually all learned to eat from the lucite "worm hut" feeder. Oh - I was gonna post, but will just piggyback here..... after they fledged, we checked the nest to find a HUGE ant infestation under the nesting cup! Today is about day 17 or 18 for them, so we have not taken any nest pics since day 13. But yikes - guess we'll have to spray the pole from now on, in hopes to prevent! Best, Les

I have the blue-domed feeder from Duncraft and it works great. My Blues were used to a little cup that I had nailed to a tree stake, but then a very FAT Robin found it. So I bought the dome version and left the top off of it for several days while the Blues got used to the new container. The I put the dome on in it's highest position (the Robin could still get in during this "training" period). After about three more days, I lowered it to its lowest setting and then only the Blues could fit. The great thing about this feeder is that it can be hung or mounted on a pole - it has a screw-in bottom that is just the same size as a standard broom handle. I purchased a broom handle from the hardware store, gorilla glued the feeder in place for good measure, and then simply pushed the handle about 5 inches into the ground. No fuss, no muss and now only my blues can get the mealies...

I've been fortunate enough to have a pair of mockingbirds in my backyard year around for several years. They are very protective of their territory, especially to other mockingbirds. Every year, they raise two or three offspring, but run them off soon after they fledge. The only other birds they seem to tolerate are a pair of white wing doves that nest in a youpon holly tree. Maybe because the doves don't compete for the same food source. They go nuts in the spring when the flocks of Cedar Waxwings come through and strip off the remaining winter youpon holly berries, which is the mockingbirds main food source in winter. They are overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of Waxwings, but just complain loudly. The most interesting thing is they mate for life, but go through a re-bonding ritual every spring. They face each other on the ground about 2 feet apart, and the male will hop forward and place a youpon berry on the ground, then hop back. The female then hops forward, picks up the berry and hops back. They do this several times a day until they finally go off and build a new nest and lay eggs.