oh come on now! She must've been smokin something. I've seen lots of deer lately on the side of the road and they ignore my car and keep eating except for the babies. We have coyotes and recently spotted Black bear. There are a few deer that cross over each evening from one side of the road to the other every night. They killed one baby oak a couple years ago, but there is so much other land around they moved on, thank goodness. In the summer the dogs would announce their arrival by the neighbors pond before the deer crossed the road as it started to get dark.

I don't have much to add about moving the trees. Fall is a good time to do it. I've done it many times. Usually I make cuts with the shovel straight down around the tree. With a tree an inch in diameter I'd probably make a circle of cuts about 2 feet away from the tree, a foot deep, then make a kind of trench outside those cuts, then slice under the tree. For the smaller maple, I'd probably start about 18 inches around the tree and do similar. Except for male trees (for types that have male varieties), or trees that are special clones, all trees make seeds. I wish more people would find places to plant the seedlings that come up. I wouldn't let people discourage you from keeping volunteer trees. So many nursery grown trees are clones, I worry that we are losing genetic diversity. Plus, a lot of nursery grown trees in containers tend to have girdling roots that I find hard to tease out. A local seedling is more likely to be locally adapted than a tree grown at a distant tree farm. I've grown seedling maples, ginkgos, oaks, honey locusts. It's a nice feeling to see them grow tall and strong.

Thanks Carol, sea myrtle sounds cool; think I'll keep it around. I found some packages of Ball freezer boxes awhile back in a thrift store; so I've been blanching and freezing green mixtures for a bit now. Need to do some more this week. I put greens in just about everything. Later this week I'm going to make a crockpot lasagna where I use layered green in lieu of pasta for the lower layers. I will let you all know how it turns out. I'm am so pleased to be having tomatoes getting ripe. Starting tomato seed in November turned out to be one of my better bright ideas. It was just a few pots so carrying them in and out wasn't too much. Having early tomatoes now is so worth it. The fountain is so nice, can't wait to get all finished around it. Hopefully today I will bring home a few small pond fish. I moved some of the bright lites chard over near the fountain. It was going anyway from being in full sun; so it will be interesting to see if it stays perennial in the dappled sun. And for now, it brings some color to the area. I've also got some Florida Variegated Collards that I'm going to plant over here and see how they do. They are also suppose to be perennial. Not that I think they would taste all that good in August. Thanks for the compliments everybody .... blush ~dianne

It's an ash. Look around your neighborhood and see who has an ash tree to see what kind. I have Arizona ash...and I just removed a giant one in the front yard. I know nothng about Texas ash, but Arizona gets to be a large tree very quickly. Pretty fall leaf color, but susceptible to borers, rot, and if it's female...drops a boatload of seeds everywhere. Every tree has it's use, but if you don't have a large space away from your house (root system is extensive and can cause trouble), I'd just cut that one down and paint the stump with RoundUp very carefully. I think you might have a really hard time digging it up, anyway--by the time they are that tall, they are rooted really well.