My neighbors, their dog, the darn soccer ball that frequently ends up in my gardens (deliberatly kicked over the 8 foot high cedars in their yard). They don't understand the concept of put the dog on a leash and that my gardens are not your dogs prsonal toilet. Have it pee in your own *&^% yard! What's worse is it isn't even down at the end of the lawn, it is up right near my front porch. I have even been out gardening and had the dog come running up and pee next to me! It has knocked my niece over several times. The neighbor got upset when my sister yelled at her to come and the dog after it had just knocked over my 2 year niece (and this is a woman in hr 50's). Doesn't understand why no one wants her dog running all over the place 5 houses away. Hmmm, we all either keep our dogs on a long leash, have underground fencing, or (and I know it's a radical thought but..) TRAIN your dog to stay on the front lawn! Finally got the dog sorta dealt with. She got the hint I think, when one of the other neighbors (who also has a dog) told her to get the d@@M dog on a leash or he would call by-law on her. Now we get to have fun with the grandchildren who live with her. (It is the grandmother, mother, brother and mother's 2 sons who live together). The 2 boys are a human demolition team. If they look at it, it is broken. They are forever climbing on our fence (already cost me $200 to have a section repaired), tormenting our dogs, walking into our fenced in backyard to get the ball the uncle purposely kicks over the fence. I have told them I don't know how many times, one of our dogs is 13, deaf and doesn't like strangers. If he is in the FENCED in yard and you go back there, he will not hear you, you will surprise him and might get bit. SO STAY OUT OF MY YARD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I guess on Friday they kicked the ball so hard against our house that things fell off the wall (my brother actually hid the ball in our shed after that. They came into our backyard when we weren't home and searched til they found it) If I had of known that, I wouldn't have given them back the ball on Saturday. Then I discovered that at some point they have been jumping the fence to get into my backyard, because every hosta all along the fence line is nothing but broken stocks now and the ball landed in my grandmother's peony. I have babied that bush for years to get it to a good size. It is highly sentimental and not replacable (same with some of my hostas, came from my nighbor who is noe deceased). They got told in no uncertain terms if the ball comes into my yard again, you will get back with a steak knife in it as I tired of having my property damaged (and no, talking to the mother or grandmother does no good whatsoever). Wanna guess what came flying into my backyard on Sunday afternoon? And landed in my fern? And whose mommy told them they would get it back later when we weren't home? ANd whose mommy got told if I caught her in my backyard I would charge her with trespassing so stay the hell out of my back yard? I feel like I have to fortify my house just to keep them out of my yard and to stop having my stuff damaged. I am so tired of spending my weekends repairing things the precious little darlings break. I think I am going to set up a video camera, keep a running tally of all the damage they have done to my house and give mommy and grandma a nice bill for what it has cost me so far.

Getting that time of year and plans are to once again try to get one more rambler going. Every rambler I have tried for the last couple years has not lasted the season or ended up so weakened it dropped dead the following spring. This year's prospects or victims (whichever way you want to look at them) are: Don Juan - This is supposed to be fairly tough and highly regarded in areas where black spot and powdery mildew is a problem. Alchymist - Somewhat familiar with this one but never tried it myself. New Dawn - We'll see about that. Cl Jeanne Lajoie - Cool Name. I figure one of these four may make it to year two. They were on sale anyway. We decided to try something else where the Malus Prairie Fires recently expired and that something else is wine grapes. I actually made a couple calls and did a little research on this, didn't care for the advice I got so I settled on the Marquette Grape. "Marquette is a promising new red wine variety that combines high levels of cold hardiness and disease resistance with excellent wine quality..... "Adaptation. Marquette appears to have considerable promise not only in the Upper Midwest, but also in Eastern grape growing regions such as Michigan, New York, New England, and Quebec." The problem I think will more than likely center around leaf scorch and dehydration from the summer winds. With that in mind, I am thinking a east / west orientation with wind breaks on either side might do the trick. I ordered three, figuring one will promptly die. We'll see how that works out. Anything else of interest...... Not really, other than we might soon to find out how Canadian GoldenDoodles adapt to the Great Northwest if the time frame is right. If it isn't, we are looking at red or apricot standard poodles. Not exactly garden related, but if any one has opinions on standard poodles, we would be interested. My experience with poodles is specifically confined to the little teacup and slightly larger old, almost always white football dogs with the gray circles around their eyes, tear streaks down to their nose and temperments paralleling those of dachshunds. I am sure you have seen them - walk by an expensive full sized car and get startled out of you skin by a pint sized Mike Tyson wannabe, held by a little old man or lady who just can't quite seem to figure out why their darling little poodle is going nuts yapping at you, an innocent passerby. Makes me wish I carried mace. ~dRahme

This post keeps coming back, like the flu during school semesters. I have grown Devil's Trumpet for two years now. (Anyone bother to notice this is was written 3 gardening seasons ago?) I chose it because thorn apples cause a bad trip - hallucinations - more often than death. Didn't work. Squirrels haven't tried it. Then again, squirrels have stopped bothering us. We covered our tomatoes with fruit tree netting and squirted the little suckers unmercifully, when they got under the netting anyway. It was funny. Their natural reaction was to run upward, but the only escape was to run down and out. Soaked little tree rats. I think we tramatized them. They go by our yard over the telephone pole wires, and stare at us, hard, as they go by. One little movement from us has them running for three more yards before they pause. lol Not total triumph though. The squirrels didn't bother our plants all summer (two little diggy spots, but that's easily resolved by adding stones, glass marbles, or rose cane.) Instead, late blight wiped out our tomatoes and are now going for our peppers. I'm originally from South Jersey of "Jersey tomatoes" fame, so I'm passionate about tomatoes. Here it is, August and no more homegrown tomatoes this year. As for worrying about poisoning the critters with thorn apples. I did consider the fall out. IF it killed them (and I assumed they'd take a bite and decide it didn't taste good, so would get sick and hallicinate, teaching them stuff in our garden isn't good), by the time it killed them, it would have digested enough and they would have been too bad looking, so there would be no critters eating it that aren't also invasive to the area. (Starlings and pigeons. Two other cirtters that deserve no fretting about.) The logic of not killing a species that has outgrown its territory eludes me. The same "logic" is used for deer, oppossum, racoons, and a variety of other species that just don't work in a city. Because politicians worry about animal activists, instead, people in the city are in danger from "harmless" animals. Rabies has come back as a problem easily correctible. Cars run into deers on a major city thoroughfare. And squirrels? Well, those suckers destroy roofs, crawl spaces, and wiring when they seek new nesting areas by invadig our homes. All things rectifiable, if animal activists would simply realize, an overflow of critters in a city is bad for the people living there. Not like squirrels are on the endangered species list. If anything - too many. A shame, they are tasty, but shooting in the city has its problems, too. (People worry about invading critters, but not hungry people.) As for not wishing that on a worse enemies - cool. Your life has been good. My worse enemies have caused enough physical damage that I wouldn't mind making them sick and have them hallucinate on thorn apple either. I wouldn't intentionally poison them, but if they were foolish enough to eat one, I wouldn't warn them about the danger until they chewed a couple of times. It's really a matter of degrees on what enemies have done. What's been done to me deserves jail time, at best. There was a day when those enemies would have been killed for their actions. Never underestimate waht "worse enemy" is to some people. Now, don't mind me. Keep arguing back and forth. This post keeps returning because, face it, "Tree Squirrels are Winning." I just hope others learn how we stopped being hassled by them.

I have no furbabies of my own now, but here are the grandpets First, here is Ruby Do. She is 8. I don't get to see her much. She lives with son-in-law 120 miles away. Dinky the Schnoodle at 2 months. She is close by and subject to spoiling by Grandma Dinky this past summer held by Grandma. She is a die hard lap dog.