I also live in Virginia, and was thinking about the British hedge for privacy reasons. I took a roadtrip in the UK several years ago, and my first notice of hedgerows was while driving a one-lane country road in my car rental. The roads were extremely narrow, with little room for mistakes. Initially, I feared accidentally scratching the paint while maintaining the center of the lane. Then, my fear turned into terror when the hedgerows intermittently vanished in favor of a stone walls. It scared the crap out of me. Needless to say, the hedgerows return was a welcome sight. I know I am writing this well after the first post, but for anyone wanting a look at hedgerow building, you should check out Season 2, Episode 6 of Clarkson's Farm on Amazon Prime. As for the "Americans are lazy" comment.. Americans rank relatively high as one of hardest working people in the world, especially against most developed countries. I do think Americans wouldn't take the time to maintain a hedge, but I believe it is more about 'how' they prioritize their time. Even I have berated my brother on the amount of time he spends on his yard. I have commented to him that he spends more time on maintaining it, rather than enjoying it.

Yes Ken, Perky Pet Oasis. I initially purchased at Lowes for $10, maybe 2 years ago, then they stopped selling them. I still check to this day, and nothing. I purchased additional ones on Amazon. I love them; so easy to clean, no spillage, hummers have no issue with them. I have 4. I only had the camera outside because I was attempting to get a shot of the 2 mockingbirds at my suet feeder, but I failed. Hummer came by; she didn't flinch when I walked across the deck to get it. That's always a good!

Epimediums are happiest in shade, if this is what your planting area offers. And some are very happy in dry shade but most will not be as happy in a sunnier position. Local nurseries typically offer a selection of the more common ones - E. grandiflorum, rubrum, x versicolor, etc. but there are many more species, hybrids and named cultivars available through specialty nurseries like Naylor Creek. I just got my 2010 catalog for Naylor Creek and immediately earmarked several new epis to add to my shade garden :-) And they definitely tend to be more expensive than your average perennial - sometimes a LOT more expensive. And I'd not exactly consider them a "tiny" border plant. Depending on variety, the foliage of a healthy clump can reach 12-15" tall and they can form quite wide plantings over time. But they are pretty much maintenance free, only requiring an annual grooming to remove old, tattered foliage (much like hellebores). Here is a link that might be useful: epimediums

I almost posted an observation along these lines several weeks ago. In a one-week span I noticed three separate cowbird chicks all being attended to by blue-grey gnatcatchers. There was always a single cb chick to each set of birds, and never any sign of additional BGGC chicks vying for the food. In that same time span I also noticed a CBchick being fed by a pair of indigo buntings. It's not hard to find them as they are very raucous and conspicuous. I am curious how the numbers and densities of birds most typically affected by CB predations are doing here because we have hordes of cowbirds, yet I always hear/see vireos and thrushes and others that are prime targets for parasitism. I check my nest boxes regularly and destroy any CB eggs in the hopes that at least my small wooded acreage can better sustain songbirds in a time of decline, but we live in farmland with any remaining wooded areas being highly fragmented. Flocks of winter 'blackbirds' are usually groupings of redwings, starlings, grackles and cowbirds fattened up on a steady and readily available farmland diet. I only wonder what our songbird demographics will do in the next few decades.