Sherry, Notify Ground Crew was my first really tall acquisition. It's fragrant and a good rebloomer if you keep it well watered, too. The blooms will open around six in the evening and they'll be closing by early morning the next day. If you have any interest in hybridizing, it's a pretty good seed-setter. Pollinate it when the blooms are fresh in the early evening. It gives a lot of tall seedlings, but, naturally, the yellow is pretty dominant in the offspring. I always enjoy it because I work days and many of the other daylilies aren't fresh when I get home, but NG Crew was just beginning to open. It has an amazing number of buds on those tall scapes. Hope you enjoy it! Bob

If this is the same brown nocturnal beetle that I've got, then yes it is the Asiatic garden beetle. They definitely prefer some plants over others and although I might be imagining this they seem to really go for the herbs -- basil, pineapple sage, mint etc. They also really love my sunflowers! Other stuff they don't touch at all. The only way I have found to control them is late-night patrols with a container of soapy water. Knock 'em in and drown 'em. During the day they burrow around the roots (and eat them!) You can usually flood them out by filling the root area with water. In the spring, get rid of them by pulling the white grubs from the soil. Also, slimy white stuff = egg sacs. I've had to trash all my pineapple sage, they were skeletalized! They attack some coleus, but not others. Hmm . . . They have also done damage on my woodland Asters and Beautyberry but they don't touch the Bugbane, geranium, or heuchera which are planted in the same bed. Go figure.

You'd know if a squirrel was in there. I'm guessing a mouse. I've tried PB and they can often lick it off without springing it. Bait the trap with a small cube of cheese wedged in well so the trap will spring. You'll get your critter.

Really, you can get the SP oatmeal at Big Lots? I'm going to have to check there the next time I go to Big Rapids, I did see that they have a much expanded "grocery" section when I was there last. Sally, I had to laugh at the remark about milk and sugar on grits. We were on a trip to DisneyWorld when my oldest daughter was about 8 or 9. We stopped for breakfast in Georgia and there was a small bowl of grits on the side of her breakfast plate. Being from Michigan she thought it was Cream of Wheat and promptly put milk and sugar on it. She tasted it, made an ugly face and told me how awful it was. (Well, of course it was, she was expecting Cream of Wheat, LOL) The waitress promptly replied in a very superior tone "That's because here in the south everyone KNOWS you put butter on grits". The tone prompted me to reply "perhaps, be we're from Michigan where people have enough good sense to NEVER eat grits". It wasn't true, of course, some of us do eat grits. That's not why I don't like grits, they just remind me of cornmeal mush, which I ate way too much of in my childhood. Polenta does too, it's just uppity cornmeal mush, LOL. I never used to eat oatmeal either, the texture was too "gummy". I eventually learned to get past that and I like the long cooked oats. So does Amanda but Ashley will only eat CocoWheats if forced to eat hot cereal, and she puts a LOT of sugar on it. I'm not sure it even counts as cereal, there's so much sugar.... I have a bag of Bob's Red Mill 10 grain cereal in the pantry that I use for baking bread. I ought to try some as cereal, I suppose. Annie