After scanning the internet, I found a suggestion of about one drop of extract per cup of sugar solution. However, I've used hummingbird feeders for years giving them just a plain sugar water solution with no additives, and they've always seemed to like that just fine. Flavored extracts are expensive, nutritionally void, and they're also mostly made up of alcohol, something I don't think the birds really need. My recommendation is to just try using a solution of four parts boiling water to one part sugar with nothing else in the mixture. If that seems to work well enough for you, then you shouldn't need to worry about adding anything else. Enjoy your bird watching. Hummingbirds are truly remarkable creatures!

Mud... If it has the correct minerals and always stays moist, you have created a butterfly buffet. I am not sure what minerals attract butterflies.

Cape Fuschias are natives of South Africa and are reliably hardy only in USDA Plant Hardiness Zones 8 and 9. (Here's a link to the USDA zone map for the Pacific Northwest: http://www.usna.usda.gov/Hardzone/hzm-nw1.html) It looks like, depending on exactly where in the Pacific Northwest you live, the plants should be able to overwinter successfully outdoors. Mulching over the winter isn't a bad idea, and then you can cut it back almost to the ground in the spring. It looks like a nice plant!

It might be lacking nutrients such as potassium...

Help - in 2 weeks we will have to dig up the front of my father-in-laws home to repair basement walls. We are trying to settle his estate and the house is for sale. I'm hoping that I might save two or three of his lovely rose bushes (bad time of year to do this to them though), but am happy to lose the big evergreen/yew thing and the brick planter. I think the planter makes the house seem shorter and it's absence will open things up. But . . . what to do to nicely define the entryway? Your suggestions would be SO appreciated!!!

[image]http://www.flickr.com/photos/65983835@N07/6033017211/in/photostream[/image]

NO idea if this picture will appear (first timer), but the link to it is:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/65983835@N0...hotostream

i have a bug on my tall phlox and have had for years. the bug is orange with a black strip down the middle. he/she does not live in the dirt and he/she does not fly, that i've seen. he/she seems to suck the green out of the leaves because they become mottled and disfigured. this bug does not kill the plant. it must lay eggs repeatedly in the flower buds. i have tried a granular insecticide, sevin dust and eight with no lasting luck. there are other perennials in the same bed but they are unaffected. i have tall phlox in other parts of my yard with no bugs. hot weather like we are having now or cooler weather doesn't seem to make a difference. these bugs come back every year. help.

A smorgasbord awaits them as well as a nursery for the Monarchs (swamp milkweed and butterfly weed). Alas! No customers except one small white guy.
Any ideas? Any encouragement?
Thank you,
... rita b
Garden Addict and Sometime Librarian

Our dear, sweet cat gave up some of her abundance of hair she sheds 24/7...to the Violet Green Swallow's for nest building materials this year. Since birds have no sense of smell...I thought it was appropriate that cats get a good name for "something". Our cat never goes outside...but she loves watching the birds from a sunny windowsill. She has to earn her keep somehow! [img]/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]

I am looking for tasty, but disease resistant, tomato varieties. I like Brandywine, but have had trouble with fungal diseases which occur even when I rotate my tomato plant location. Other varieties I have tried do not have the flavor I remember from childhood. Any recommendations on good varieties? Tips on controlling the fungus?

I would like to plant perennial flowers where there are tree and shrub roots. Do I need to be concerned about hurting the existing trees and shrubs if I cut through their roots in order to dig holes for the flowers?