I’ve been wondering if I’ve pulled a Rip Van Winkle and slept through summer and fall. Advanced thinking had a hooligan cage just a few feet away, which was quickly placed over the tree before other damage occurred. Luckily the tree only sustained a broken off leaf and no other damage. Levi who’d been picking on Blackie again was running for his life and ran to me to save him and sat on my tree before I could stop him. After digging in compost and getting the hole dug, I pulled the tree out of it’s container and sat it in the hole. I decided to put it on the north side of one of my Heritage birch trees in the front yard and of course put a hooligan cage around it. I purchased a small Golden Shadows Pagoda dogwood at the Huntsville Botanical Gardens a few weeks back and have been looking for a nice visible shady spot for this variegated dogwood which needed to be an understory tree. Everyone in the area is trying to help bring some normalcy back into their lives. Another group is trying to replace music instruments volunteers spend their weekends going to these two towns and also to Moulton and other parts of Lawrence county to help. Phil Campbell’s prom was held in the Shoals last weekend, and the hospital group I work for is sponsoring their sports award banquet this week. Hope is that Wrangler will rebuild it’s factory in Hackleburg as it is the largest employer in town. The tornado clean up continues in Hackleburg and Phil Campbell. I had almost 100% germination this time, and I’ll have enough squash to feed an army. I took some single ply toilet paper and lined up my seeds down the middle and rolled it up length wise and put the wad into recycled yogurt cups and moisten the paper daily until the seeds started sprouting. I had planted some several weeks earlier but only had one come up. Saturday it was too wet to plow the garden, and my crooked neck and Zapallo scallop squash needed to be planted.

I’ve saw a bluebird carrying one to her nest, but haven’t seen many other birds after them. I hope the birds are having a feast right now. The cicadas, what the dogs haven’t eaten, they’ve rolled in. I finally figured out what was causing the odor when I saw Blackie, the most aromatic of the three rolling in something. The hooligans have been extremely stinky even from six feet away. You can’t hear yourself think when you are outside. They get more numerous and louder each day. The 13 year cicadas started hatching a couple of weeks ago and are slowly hatching out to the north. Check out one of my four posts of my hummingbirds at my feeders last September. The red on the feeder itself is enough to attract hummers. Make your own by using 1 part of sugar and 4 parts of hot water. One advantage of using wire is that if you don’t quite get the hole in the center, you can bend the wire after hanging to level the cap.ĭon’t use the colored dye sugar water. Other materials needed are a cap off of a spray can, a nail or ice pick or drill bit, a pipe or pipe or broom handle, pliers, and water proof caulking. # 1 RULE, USE GLOVES WHEN DOING THIS PROJECT. Another design used a screen door latch which I had on hand after replacing a screen door on the back porch. One design uses a heavy gauge wire, such as electric fence wire, which I also had on hand for making homemade plant tags. I came up with a couple of designs for making home made ones very inexpensive. I looked at it and said to myself, I can make this. I found one at the end of the season at a very deep discount. I priced some of the store bought ant barrier containers and they were very expensive. With the abundance of fire ants in my area, I like many was having problems with ants getting into the feeders and ruining the sugar water. With the hummingbirds migrating back into the US, everyone is putting up feeders.

Diy hummingbird feeder moat