Garden photos of '09.....#11

Very nice, Patti.

reticulated iris and a hyacinth

few more hyacinths

Thanks folks!

Nice Bill! It's great to see that you finally have some color!!

Patti, those crocus and iris are a really pretty combination together! Nice pictures too. If I can find the picture of that hellebore before it started to fade, I will. It was an interesting combination of green and pink.

Karen, I forgot to ask you what kind of a hellebore that was up up above. It's great. I have a stray cat that I let stay on the back porch because it does help with the critters. It only gets the back porch because it's meaner than H@!!. It's really good with mice and voles, but only ok with the moles and gophers. (they are a pretty big kill for the size of cat it is) It hunts all day long and usually gets stuff. Unfortunately it's just not that big of a cat and there's more here than it can possibly deal with.

My first daffs opened today but they're soggy right now.

lol... figures that's how it be! a sort of murphy's law in the gardner's world.

always seems to happen that way Victor...

love the tiny iris

thanks allison - amazing what you can find at HD :)

i posted some other pics on the "what have you bought thread" - i've been pc challenged today

They were talking about critters on an ABC show this morning. The woman - she replaced Martha Stewart........ Any ways she was showing how to get rid of squirrels - human hair. Yup hair. Then deer, rabbits, you know the pests - human urine. Get your husband and his friend and put them to work. I am not kidding here.

Yep, I had heard that before Sherrie! I also heard that it's more effective if it's male urine. The down side is the ummm..... amount required to cover a yard. lol. And it helps to be married or a long to beau! Can you imagine if I went over to one of my neighbors and asked 'ummmm.... I have a big favor to ask you?......'
I'd need several large glasses of any alcoholic beverage before I could pull that one off!

The hair, not a problem. I can do that!

Just give the guys beer and say - this is your area. I want it done by tomorrow!

I'm going to try. Morrigan mentioned that some time ago.

no wonder i don't have deer in the summer!!

Wonder if certain brands of beer work better?

take no chances try them all

I can write 'Keep out!'

We did not notice any less damage with the use of Milorganite, but we have so many deer that I would need all of Milwaukee’s biproduct from the city's water treatment process plant for a week. Patti

Well since the snow cleared and I re-sprayed with Liquid Fence, the deer have not been around. Fingers remain crossed.

DH sprayed a couple of weeks ago and they are back. If there is ever another Arc, please don't let them on. We are having enough rain here to start building one. Patti

That stinks. Your (extra) problem is that they are limited in where they can go.

DH say a doe moving across the backyard this afternoon. She finally spooked from him, maybe she will remember that a bad man lives here. He did not see where she exited the property, probably came in from the street. A friend on Concord has already picked up 2 ticks & he has other illness to combat.. He will check the fence tomorrow to see the exit.

We found a tick on my little guy last night. It was just above his underarm and was already pretty fat with his blood. He was only outside with me for about 1/2 hour, though he could have picked it up at school too. Nasty.

I've never seen a tick.

http://www.health.state.mn.us/divs/idepc/diseases/lyme/images/slide21.gif

I hate ticks, a few yrs ago I had one dug into the back of my neck hubby couln't get it out with tweezers, had to go to the doctor, they couldn't get it out, had to have a surgeon cut it out and then had to causterise it. Every time I think about it gives me the willies.

Well I pulled it out of my son with tweezers, but one little part stayed in. I have a tick puller, but could not find it at the time. We will watch it closely. My older guy already had lyme.

Bad. The rabbits are covered with ticks too. Patti

Victor, We take that big dose of doxycycline (200 MG) if we find one attached immediately. The trick supposedly is to grab the tick and pull it out in one motion, so that if the tick does carry Lyme, it does not have time to release it. If you annoy it, it is more likely to inject you. Not to worry about left parts, except for local infection. I hope he is fine, spring numbers for carriers are far less than the fall. Patti

Gee, Debi, I get ticks on me all the time! The one that did the damage was in for a week & had deteriorated---pretty much. Sorry to hear your little guy had Lyme, Victor. Mine wasn't diagnosed as Lyme---just bacterial arthritis---but I was on prednisone for 12 years---now I have Swiss cheese bones! It never ends!

Robindog, That sounds like a nightmare. I have taken prednisone briefly for various things, but never for more than a a week or so at a time for poison ivy and briefly for reactions to spider bites. My older brotherhas had to take it on and off for his Crohn's disease, but they monitor it carefully, because, I guess it can cause kidney trouble. I hate trying to keep up with all the medical information we are bombarded with. Be well all. And think sun! Patti

I've seen doses of 100mg of prednisone a day - had to double check with the doc to make sure it was the right dose because it was so much.

This message was edited Apr 4, 2009 1:10 PM

Wow - that's high, Deb. Rheumatoid arthritis?? The tick has to be attached for at least 24-26 hrs for the lyme to be transmitted.

pemphigus

Never heard of that.

Shelly, I don't know what variety that hellebore is, but when I saw it 2 years ago at a local nursery I had to have it, even though I had to pay $15 for a quart size pot. But it was blooming at the time, so I knew that I wouldn't have to wait on it.

Victor, I bought Liquid Fence just recently, and I think I will do some spraying tomorrow. I hope it will not wash off with all the rain we are expecting on Monday. We got a lot of it today. Good thing I was working and didn't have any time on my hands to play in the yard today and yesterday. I would have been bummed with all the rain keeping me from doing anything.

Bummer about the Lyme disease. My father had it and it got into the final stages where it gets into the brain. He has permanent memory loss now from it. He had to take IV antibiotics for 2 wks. Poor guy! I don't wish that on anyone. I think a tick has to be attached for at least 24 hours to transmit the disease, and I was told by a Lyme specialist that it takes up to 6 wks for the disease to show up on a test. My father was tested shortly after getting a tick bite, and he tested positive. Turns out that would have been from a bite that happened at least 3 years prior, so he'd had it all that time. That was around the time his symptoms of dementia started. So he may not have Alzheimer's, it may be a condition brought on by Lyme. Too sad that it's not reversible.

Karen

Karen, so sorry about your dad. I too had my sever Lyme affect my brain for several years. I was not fluid with my speak, very confused and my memory was fried. I would ask the same questions constantly and mangle words. I couldn't remember my sons name or substitute words like calling the refrigerator a giraffe. I may have been young enough to get better, though they didn't think I would.

I had massive amounts of experimental IV therapy. I am still in a study being done by Harvard and several hospitals to follow my medical history. But I have mostly recovered, though it took several years to be able to drive again. They did MRI brain scans, spinals and all kinds of seriously scary and painful nerve tests all about 20 years ago. But strangely I have no idea of the exact years, as they are mostly lost in a tick haze. My gardening days were over for quite a few years until I regained enough strength, energy and flexibility plus being able to get over my terror of the ticks to start working outside again. It is now my full time therapy. But be careful all. Patti

Sherrie thanks for the tip on keeping squirrels away. I have a daylily eater here and I need some ways to keep them out of the new ones I'm getting. I used to be a hairdresser and we had a client that would come in and ask for our hair! She said it was the best thing she had found for keeping deer out of the yard. Lol back then I wasn't into garden as much as now. So I remember thinking she was crazy! Not that I didn't believe her - I just thought it was so funny that she would go to this length to keep it. Now I think it is a good idea! lol : )

Omg I got so excited about the hair trick that I didn't finish reading the thread befor I posted that.I am so sorry for your dad. And Patti I am so glad your ended up getting better.

Meredith79, Thanks for the healthy wishes.

Hair because it smells like people would work if my deer had any fear of me. They just stroll by unless I do the mad chasing, totally crazy lady with a shovel routine. Not pretty.
And mostly they do their dining by moonlight. Oh, so romantic, those dear deer. Patti

Lol that shovel act gave me a Lucille Ball visual !