The picture that I entered first was a waterfall taken with my old Nikon Coolpix. I was still debating what else to enter, I thought waterfalls would be a pretty common entry so I was thinking the dragonfly had a little better chance. I also liked this head shot of the blue dasher. I must say though that the damselflies are my favorite odonata. I had fun this summer photographing them - I had hoped to get out to some of the lakes to find more but never made it past my own pond and the creek. They are a bit more of a challenge than the dragonflies due to their small size but if you are patient you can get pretty close to them. Here are some of my favorites from this summer ... This is an american rubyspot, their coloring looks more like it's been drawn on ... Here is a blue-fronted dancer ... An eastern forktail that was just developing it's color - I have a whole series showing the color development but haven't had time to process them.... An ebony jewelwing ... they look like butterflies when they fly across the water ... And a mating pair of double-striped bluets ....

The contest is officially over!! and if I can ever get this phat cat photo to cross over you'll see the phat lady sing! Thank you all for the warmth and humor you've shared - I really need it now that we're not going to see 10F for another week. (-30F windchills for the next 4 days - yes, sympathy please). SO! It's up to the judges now, the panel of 4 has their work cut out for them. We're picking 1 winner in the pond (aquarium) catagory, and 1 in the non-pond related catagory. Each winner will have $25 donated in their pet's name to HSDM. And as I've told the judges, every photo here is fair game, because while some photos are of the pet involved in their OCD behavior, other pix are of the pets and the stories are of their OCD behavior. And, yes, the owner's OCD! We're all family here and a picture of Aunt Mable snoozing in the Lazy Boy may bring up fond memories of that great Thanksgiving when she got a little tipsy and fell asleep before the pecan pie! There's often alittle history behind a photo. Winners will be announced SUPER BOWL Sunday! Thanks everybody!

Antmary - 10 flowers - that is impressive - that is what I would expect from my experience with Brandy Boy - you should have a prolific plant! Interesting observation about the leaves! I noticed Yolo's plant leaves are more similar to your plant (nice tomato Yolo!). I went back and looked at our plants when they were even younger than yours - and the leaves are very large. It must be a function of my soil and fertilizer? Which plant will produce bigger/better tomatoes? Perhaps your plant - as much of my plant's energy appears to be going to the leaves? It may not be a function of pruning as the photo shows my plant before I prune suckers? It may be a GH affect? I am sure Carolyn would have an answer !

Wow! Missing out on all the fun here after reformatting my entire disk drive for two nights, uggg, and days straight :-( pennypond, I love your innovative cage/trellis support system - it really looks sharp! What an excellent use of that Hortonova webbing. I'm thinking about getting some to hang horizontally in my hoop where my plants are out of control, like a cheap version of what Hudson has in his GH! I bet my tomatoes aren't as big as you think. The other guys have the big 'uns, I'm just happy to participate and learn about this variety and see how many different growing styles everyone has. Loved your pics! forgottenone, are things heating up in Michigan yet? If not can I pipe some of our heat up there! Sey & goodground, thanks for summing up who's here, I had no idea there were so many! Beautiful pics of your piece of paradise, Sey, nicely arranged! delbar, hang in there. Brandy Boy seems to be a weak plant at the beginning to me even if you have healthy seeds. I had bad seeds, and very low germination, but my sole-surviving plant is falling in line now and doing well, after a rough start. Nitsua, Really enjoyed your closeups of your panicles of tomato flowers! caryltoo, don't forget the most interesting looking tomato, too!!! Lots of categories to try out for and I think one on total yield from a plant would be my favorite to win if I could choose hahaha!!! socalgirl, nice plant and I really like your Tomato Towers, and now that mine are covered in rust that goes everywhere I can see how it's worth it! Yay for that first blush! tripleione, I love the simplicity of your weave! I hope Brandy Boys aren't too heavy with tomatoes to be held up, but I guess there are worse problems to have than that! hoosier, that is one nice Indiana farm. If I ever get some land it is just the sort of thing I'd like to do! To think you don't have to water. If I could do that there would be no stopping me to plant acres of tomatoes! Daniel, I don't use mulch and that is a problem. But it attracts moths. I try to cover the ground with plastic for the better or worse and my plants are in containers uncovered. Greenhouses don't work here but I have a greentunnel ... BrB is outside in the heat though ;-) Hudson, Beautiful pics and now you're on this year! LOL!!!...I hope we don't outgrow GW and need a website all of our own. Maybe we should reserve brandyboycentral.com!!! Great job on the category summary. Was there a reason you didn't include October or even November entries, I'd been meaning to ask and apologize I missed that. Now I better break out my old guitar, it's getting hotter by the minute in the kitchen here for serenading and taking our Brandy Boy girls out to dinner (they are Tomboys to me, haha get it? with a name like Brandy ;-) NCrealestate guy, I bet you're getting close to ripe BrBs too! Here's my stuff so far, showing my two largest tomatoes, they are only passing the 4-ounce mark (113 g) by now, due to a late start. My real season would be October/November based on the dates of the contest, but I'll definitely have a BrB tomato by July 1 -- I think & hope! PC