Bourbons love NY & I have yet to meet a Bourbon I didn't love I was at Brooklyn Botanical Gardens on Saturday & saw my old Catherine Guillot there. I have such a small amount of space to garden in I donated A Marie de St Jean, a Hermosa & Catherine Guillot to the Cranford Rose Garden in turn they let me have a rooted canary Island.

Sarah - I think most people haven't seen the babies. It's always been a standard joke about people never seeing baby pigeons. But then I guess that's because they tend to nest high up on buildings and grow up so fast. l know there are folks who raise show pigeons as a hobby so they obviously see them. The above 2 were born around the middle - end of June and were mature and flying by the beginning of August (they learned by practicing to flap while jumping off my larger containers... LOL). One main difference about them vs the hummer is that the male and female are a mated pair and both help to raise the babies. The mother will leave the nest during the day and get some food for herself while the father watches the nest from his perch nearby. If the babies start screaming, he'll go get them some food and feed them and check on them, then he'll go back out on his perch and "guard the nest". LOL At night, the mother comes back to the nest and sleeps with them, including doing some feeding and the father will sleep somewhere else for the night. It was interesting to watch this whole dynamic unfold. This was mom and one of her babies. Dad was out on the ledge.... "guarding". LOL Sorry to hear about the damage you had from the storms and tornadoes. When there's heat like that, any cold front coming through can produce some nasty storms and tornadoes. I remember that tornado that went through Morris Arboretum that's not that far up the street from me and they lost something like 200 trees. And the remnants of the hurricanes were pretty rough (I think it was Isabel then?). Even last year this time, we had some bad flooding rains. Monday will be the 1-year anniversary of a particularly bad torrential rain event where we got something like 6" of rain in an hour and it washed out Cresheim Valley Drive (which they finally repaired and opened a couple months ago). Then it happened again the following week I think. Such is Mother Nature!

Jen, WOW..WOW..WOW.. 2 posts in a row lol. Your on a roll, you must be on vacation, or maybe since your babies are getting ready for their naps you have more time lol... J/K ;P I was told by an importer and seller of Thai plumies, that no plumie in Thailand is an exclusive as there is so much theft as most of the growing fields are acres and acres of land, in some cases over 40 plus acres. Even if someone like JJ or Kukiat has a seedling that blooms that they own, a worker/random person/even friend of the owner may steal/get a branch or the whole plant. That is why you see so many plumies that are supposedly exclusive 1 of a kind plumies, being sold by another seller or a few from Thailand selling them on Ebay and other places and with different names. Example is Fireblast being imported and sold by BBB this season on Ebay, there is also another seller from Thailand that sells it for under 20.00 under a Thai name, not Fireblast. This seller sells legit items as I have bought from them in the past and has been on Ebay forever. A friend of mine bought hers 2 yrs ago or so from this seller in Thailand and her FB bloomed true for the past 2 seasons. With Thai Peach it was a JJ's exclusive in Thailand. Per John the Mother tree was either lost/stolen or destroyed. Since 2005, I have seen a few Thai Peaches being sold on Ebay from Thailand, but not sure it is the same as plumie photos from there look different than the ones grown here. All I know is that Sonia did more to market, sale/distribute JJ's Thai Peach than anyone else. In 2005 Sonia bought out all the Thai Peachs from John that she could find (5gal multi tipped plumies for 55.00 back then from JJ's). Sonia then resold the Thai Peach's and cuttings to other people. Thats how I got mine in 2005 (5gal was about 4ft, multi tipped) along with the Morgan's and many in the Inland Empire area. Sonia also sold stuff on Ebay, so I am pretty sure the one Lopaka has is from Sonia aka JJ's variety. As for Brads I am not sure if that is one of JJ's/Sonia's Thai Peaches. Sonia actually got the name Thai peach from the Thai Ebay sellers in 2005 as it looked like their TP, Sonia in the early years helped John with a few names for his plumies like Golden Ray, Thai Peach, Big Red and others. Since Thai Peach was a good seller and Sonia and other bought out Johns (jjs) inventory, John went to Thailand to replenish his inventory he stated that he could not find the Mother tree of TP. So since John could not replenish TP, and did not even have one for himself, what ever is currently being sold privately and @ Plumie Society sales are most likely recirculated JJ's TP from people who had it or got it from Sonia or a few who had it still. I gave a bunch of large multi tipped cuttings to Irene Jones a few years back as my tree blew over and had all these branches break. I do know that Irene was selling some at the SD Plumie Society sale recently. So again do not know if Brads is the same as JJ's. So as of current Thai peach is not commercially avail, so you will never see it at Lowes or HD. PHEW.... That was a long one..lol Hope that answered your question regarding Brads TP..lol Laura Thanks for the compliments. Cheers y'all

Here on the Ventura Co. (CA) coast, we are "enjoying" the first long stretch of "June Gloom" we've had in years. But this morning's weather forecast insists that we will hit 80 today. (It's hard to believe.) A couple of days ago, it was SO cold that I went and put on a thick sweater, and I'm about to get that out again. It seems ironic that we finally put in air conditioning, after weeks and weeks of 100+ temperatures last year. But I don't think it will last.