Five from today.

1 of 5. Monarch on a Mexican Milkweed.

2 of 5. Another shot.

3 of 5. Sulphur on a Black Eyed Susan Vine.

4 of 5. Sulphur on Blackeyed Susan Vine on top of my A-frame.

5 of 5. Busy Bees. Wild bees of some sort were diving into and rolling around in this Water Lily.

Gorgeous pictures, trois. Could you post a long shot of your A frame so I can see what it is, how it's set up. Is it something specifically for the butterflies?

What else do you plant to get such beautiful butterflies to visit you? I see the Mexican Milkweed and the Black Eyed Susan vine, but what else do you plant to attract and bring them onto your land? Do you know what kind of bees those are on your water lily? Are they indiginous? Do you have a bee hive?

The A-frame is 16 feet long, 16 feet wide, 14 feet tall. It has an 8 foot wide 16 feet long wooden deck inside the center, with lots of sitting room. We made it specifically for flowering vines. We have several others than you have seen, such as Pink Trumpet Vine, Sky Blue Vines, Turks Cap, And a few others. There should be a thread I started about building this. It is so covered with vines at this time it is very hard to see in a photo. They are jumping across to the other sides. Many Cypress Vines.

The Bees are wild. I have no hives. We have many blooming wild flowers most of the year, GoldenRod, Cypress, West Texas Mist, Purple Gerardia, Several types of honeysuckle that bloom all year. We also have a lot of red salvia and the Mexican milkweed is wild. Cape honeysuckle also blooms all winter. Several wild morning glories. Hundreds of butterflies, more in a month or so.
Thanks to you both.
trois

This message was edited Oct 29, 2006 8:12 PM

Oh! So the A-frame is your house? Am I reading that correctly?

I wonder what kind of bees they are. You should really post a photo of them over at the Bug ID forum here to get an accurate ID.

The a-frame is in my front yard. About 15 feet from the house. It is our view out the windows.
So far, the bees have been too fast for me. They are about half the size of honey bees.
I will keep trying.

Inca Doves on the feeder. They spend a lot of time in the Purslane beds eating purslane, and bugs. They like a little early morning grain.

Another photo of the Incas. These are year round residents, and are pretty tame. Except when they are feeding.

Looking at the main entry of the A-frame. It is kind of hard to see.

A-frame from the other end, on the boardwalk that goes to the Lily pond.

Sorry, must of been having a blonde moment thinking that was your house! That is hard to see! Can you cut all those viney things off so I can see what it looks like?? (just kidding of course!)

You should be able to see some early photos posted in threads trois started early in 2005.

You mean you started? You're trois, correct? I will look, thank you!

They should either be under Pergola or A-frame. Several entries. I started with a stuck tractor. This thing was built in a bog.

Yep, me, trois, started.

Stuck tractor? Please explain.......

I made 3 identical sections for the A-frame. Each section was built on dry, level ground.
Each section was two 16 foot 4 x 4, treated wood, with 5 2 x 4 cross bar braces starting from the top where the two points of the 4 x 4 s touched, and continued to the 8 foot level. The bottoms of each of these beams were then 16 feet apart. These sections were to be dragged to the site of the construction site with my antique Ford tractor. Almost the first thing I did was be careless and get the tractor stuck in the bog. We tried with my neighbors very large tractor and almost got it stuck also. I then had to use Come-Alongs and a long cable tied to a tree to slowly pull the tractor out, 6 feet at a time. Muddy mess. After that I used the tractor out on the road with 200 feet of cable and some pulleys to move the sections into place, and then, moving the pulleys, to stand them up. Braced each section, then with my son's help, installed a 4 x 4 ridge beam, 16 feet long. Covered the sides with lattice. Planted vines.

Well trois, at least it was just stuck and didn't flip like so many tractors seem to do around here! I like your story. Things have more meaning when there's a great story behind it and I think you got it! My husband is reading over my shoulder and he grew up on a farm. He'd love to see a photo of your antique Ford tractor.

One of our neighbors flipped his into his pond a couple of years ago, pinning him under water, killing him. I have lately learned that he had bee stings and probably was swatting bees instead of watching. My paw taught me when I was very young to always keep my foot lightly on the clutch, and to push it if anything went wrong. It saved me from trouble more than once.

This message was edited Oct 31, 2006 4:11 PM

The "Stuck tractor" thread is called "Boo trap", on a thread posted 2004-11-29.

The other is "Escape from Boo trap" posted 2004-12-1.

Both will show my old antique, not restored. 1949 Ford 8n.

Oh my trois! I'm sorry to hear about your neighbor. That must of been awful for your neighbors. I'll go find the thread and bookmark it so I can show my husband. Thanks!