Mud Dauber Brown

That's the color we determined the stucco is, since this mud dauber nest blends right in! Apparently we have an organ pipe wasp (even though neither one of us are musical) whose nests are long and and resemble the way the pipes of an organ sit. Who knew??? They seem to like stucco, concrete or brick type surfaces to build their nests since they seem to hold better on them. Nice of us to provide them with a surface for their home:) They're not social, but they do like to be around human activity, they're not aggressive & rarely sting people. They feed on spiders...in fact the female paralyzes spiders, sticks them in the nest & lays an egg on them, then seals the chamber. Sounds like an instant meal when that egg hatches...just a quick spidey snack, hey there's scooby snacks for dogs....why not spidey snacks for baby daubers? Maybe we should keep them around to control our spider population....just a thought.....

A Garage with a View

We're starting on my Birthday present from last year, the walls in the garage are coming down, Tom has a guy who has done some work for him and he & his son are dismantling the garage & house to reuse the materials, windows, cupboards, etc.,etc., whatever is salvageable, the rest they will haul to the dump. Now the view from the shade garden is no longer ugly brown T-111 (plywood w/lines), but assorted misc.piles of junk. I'm just a wee bit concerned that since the guys doing this are doing it in their spare time, this project may take longer than Martha is going to be happy with...........and we all know when Martha's not Happy, neither is Poor Tom.