To all who have wished me a speedy recovery: Thank You! I am feeling steadily better (1 month out), and expect to be back to full strength shortly. @Alisande, If you think you may have babeseosis at the moment, then insist on being tested. Same with anaplasmosis, both are less-difficult than Lyme to diagnose from blood smears, I believe. (The issue with the blood supply, aside from the traditional head-in-the-sand attitude of the blood industry, and of course the cost, is that there is no rapid-enough test for babeseosis -or possibly the other tick-borne diseases -to work with the need for fresh blood.) But as I mentioned, anaplasmosis has distinct, characteristic, changes in routine blood work that are almost diagnostic. I can check next time I am in the medical library if there are specific changes in the case of babeseosis. I may have that info for erlichiosis, if you'd like to know it. Anaplasmosis has distinctive mullberry shaped artifacts (morullae) in the disease-specific blood smears (as does erlichiosis, I believe). Babeseosis is different but unless you, like I, have had malaria it's pretty distinctive in the blood test for it. The tests aren't inexpensive (the unadjusted street price for them is $500-$1,000 -each- but my insurance company whacked both of them down considerably. Since you're on Medicare, you'd only pay a percentage of the CMS-negotiated cost which is likely to be as aggressively moderated as that of my own insurance company's contractual rate. Since all three are bacterial, not spirochete, -caused it doesn't require the complex analysis of PCR bands that Lyme does. But frankly if I was on my second continuous month of Lyme I would have pretty awful constitutional symptoms from that lengthy treatment alone. I can barely make it out the 30 days of a single course before I have disturbed sleep, night sweats, muscle aches and pains, etc. Part of my fierceness about discovering ticks early is to avoid the need for the lengthy course of anti-Lyme doxy. Since doxy won't really do anything for babeseosis - and other drugs will - why keep taking what may be the wrong cure? I don't think you would experience symptoms from babeseosis or anaplasmosis (or even Lyme) infection before locating the tick. The incubation time needed to get sick from a still-attached tick would have resulted in a deer tick as big as a green pea, a nasty pearly-grey tight blob. It's hard to imagine you wouldn't have noticed it well before getting sick if it was still attached. Don't you itch like mad when you have a tick attached for more than a few hours, not to mention days? I'd be wild! BTW, the tick-hours-of-bite measurement has a built in problem: the aging relies on analysis of stomach digestive contents. But that assumes, and it is not always true, that the bite the tick was discovered making is the only bite, not a second one. Also you mentioned you squashed the critter in removing it. You might want to consider beginning more intensive searches for ticks on your body twice a day in order to not miss one. I have hair so long I can sit on it so I do realize it can be hard to check your scalp and hair. I have also found attached ticks under my breasts, in my belly button, on various unmentionable parts of my bottom, and even larval ones between my toes and fingers. I usually keep my long hair tied up in pigtail outdoors. I tuck the pigtail down the back of my shirt to minimize the likelihood of ticks getting caught in my hair. Of course I always have a hat on outside for sun protection, so my head and scalp are less-common tick areas. I do tick-checks at least twice every day of the year, unless I am away from home overnight in the city. It's just like brushing your teeth. I'm not convinced that Lyme "lurks in your body" but given that it is caused by spirochete I suppose it's possible. (Another spirochete-caused illness, syphillis, has a proven habit of lingering on and re-occurring, often despite treatment.) I know, for certain, that I have had Lyme (from clearly positive blood tests), been treated successfuly and subsequently had lengthy periods of profound physiological, and mental stress, without Lyme popping back up and adding to the problems. And I still have one band for Lyme on the latest PCR, which indicates an old, resolved infection, so there's no question it's still visible in my blood, but not thankfully making a pest of itself. I also still have serological evidence of malaria in my blood and I haven't had any illness from it in more than fifty years! But the bacterial diseases (anaplasmosis, babeseosis and erlichiosis) seem extremely unlikely lurkers and later-pouncers, especially if treated. What I definitely think they can do, however, is damage other organs and systems resulting in consequential, long-term problems (like the poor fellow described above who lost his spleen as a result of a babeseosis infection.) Your description of high fevers, muscle aches and pains, etc., sound much more like anaplasmosis than Lyme. Did you have any "regular" blood tests done at the time? The average time from bite to onset of symptoms with anaplasmosis is 8 days. I could look that time up for erlichiosis and babseosis, if needed. I don't know enough about Fibro, but aren't night sweats and aches and pains part of that, too? You may not need to go to any doctor more specialized than your primary care doc to check for the bacterial tick-borne illnesses. And then you'll be able to know, and treat, any that are there. I didn't get any hint that the tests for them lead to confusing, or contradictory results, as I know the Lyme test can, because it is a different, and more complicated test.. If you test negative for them, including having normal routine blood results, you can cross them off your list of worries and look elsewhere. (And get off the wretched doxy!) HTH, L.

Hello, All. I have just moved to St. Paul for a new job, and had to leave my beautiful butterfly/pollinator garden behind. I will be living in a downtown apartment for the foreseeable future, so I'm looking for ways to stay active in pollinator gardening. As I searched for local groups, I came across one that holds regular conferences. Doug Tallamy is speaking next month!!! I can't wait to meet/hear him. Iris, re seed sources, I have had great luck with seed trading with folks here on GardenWeb/Houzz. Go to the exchange forums and check them out. Also, once my husband follows me here, he will bring my box of native seeds. I have far more than I need, and would be happy to share. It might be up to a month before I have my seeds, though. Martha

I would suggest Mme Alfred Carriere, Ghislaine de Feligonde or her pink sport. All have the additional advantage of being lower thorn. I would agree with Mad that depending on total light you may be fighting a hard battle. That is why I ask about the wall's height and how much shade/sun it receives during the summer months. I'd try it out, but not expect a miracle. Those mentioned have done well and remained healthy in quite shady spots, but do receive some sun, especially in the spring before the trees leaf out. You will need more than one season to see how well they grow and bloom, however, so give them time unless it's obvious they're growing backwards.

@sandy (z5b nys) ha! I first planted nepeta for my own housecats (with some nagging guilt about being a parent encouraging drug use, lol). My cats have passed on but the catmint stays and has done better than possibly anything else in my garden (with the exception of madonna canadian anemones, which are crazy invasive, and the native columbines and lupins that volunteer up here in ME like weeds). The white version of nepeta is hard to find in my area but I snagged some a few years back and it’s just wonderful, smaller, more compact and tidy — actually, possibly a perfect plant for anita the OP? blooms a bit later than the blue and lasts a long time, looks a bit like baby’s breath. @anita55 – in terms of old-fashioned flowering perennials, some other straight ones that do well for me without floppage are maltese cross (3-4 ft when established — they take a few years — red-orange, about four weeks from june into early july and sporadic thereafter). Also giant hyssop is very tall and straight, to 5-6 feet, with lovely purple wands from july-august, and it always brings the monarchs. Have you tried bee balm?