I realize that we now have a conflict with the Raleigh swap. I just wanted to put it out there that while I can't change the date at this point, it isn't going to hurt my feelings if anyone decides that they would rather go to the other swap. Our swap was really only meant to be a small friendly gathering and I just thought I would see if anyone from here wanted to come since I occasionally do a little online socializing here. So.. if your interests have changed.. it's really no big deal. Maybe next time! :)

I now live in East Alabama but grew up in GA and find them to be about the same with regard to weather, temps and pests. Everyone's experience differs, the worst pests I contend with in my rural woodsy area are fire ants, yellow jackes/hornets/wasps and fruit stealing squirrels!! We also have to watch out for scorpions and they can often be found under a moist rock...sometimes they can get into the house. As was suggested, don't leave shoes unattended outside or in your garage and if you do be sure and check them first before putting them on. It's like second nature around here. Putting them up on a shelf or in a bin of some sort would be smart to avoid those nasty little surprises. I freaked out the first time I stepped on one because I thought it could be deadly....hurt worse than a hornet sting but the pain started to subside within about 10 minutes. After doing some frantic research everything I read stated that there are no deadly or highly poisonous varieties this far East so if you can ride out the pain you'll be fine and no need to go to the ER unless you have some sort of allergy to them (do people even have scorpion allergies??). Speaking of hornets...around here you will find hornet, yellow jacket and wasp nests EVERYWHERE. I usually have to do multiple wasp & hornet spray sweeps of our porch and pumphouse during the year to rid ourselves of large quantities of them. I get stung at least once a year by brushing up against the pumphouse roofline or removing Christmas garland from my porch railing. During warm winters which we can have the little buggers will persist even into the winter time. Fireants are usually easily spotted by their large mounds in the grass...learn to spot them and your life will be better. Use fire ant killer liberally if they're in an area where you like to walk or the kids play. Spiders....black widows are common as are brown recluses and probably other lesser known poisonous varieties. The widows especially love to hide in or under anything wooden that's left outside. I rarely garden or do any yard chores without gloves....and that's not just to keep my hands from blistering. Do a quick glance over on all sides if you pick anything up like a log, a big rock, an empty plant pot that's been sitting out, etc....I have read that Widow bites are actually not fatal but they can make you feel like you're dying. Never had one bite me yet knock on wood but I spot and kill quite a few each year. Ticks....lots of ticks. Check yourself and the kiddies over if they go out playing in the woods, a field, etc... Most of the snakes around here are non-poisonous but do learn to watch out for the nasty ones, they are around. We've shot several rattlers in the last few years that came too close to the house, as well as a Copperhead every now and then, but sightings on our property have dwindled. Water moccasins can also be found if you have a lake or wet area on your property. We have deer and rabbits ALL OVER the place....yet surprisingly they seem to leave my gardens alone. My outdoor cat helps keep the rabbits in check and my neighbors plant corn so I think the deer must be more interested in what they have to offer. My main vegetable plot has a 3 foot decorative fence around it which may be a mental deterrent for some deer, however they could easily jump over it. Raccoons and opossums are plentiful but usually only bother the cat or dog food if left outside at night. The most damaging warm blooded critters to my garden so far have been voles. They dine on the root systems of my daylilies....grown established plants aren't as affected but newly planted or young plants will die easily if you don't catch it in time. Larger critters....fox, bobcats and coyotes are very common. Here coyotes most of all and they can be a real problem if you have domestic animals, chickens, goats, etc....around. I've had to shoot at them to scare them, they come right up to the house at night running around just inside the woodline. I built a gate on my porch stairs so the dog and cat have a safe place to sleep at night. Neighbor raises goats and rabbits and has to have a large dog that lives with the goats and keeps the coyotes at bay. As far as bugs, the Japanese beetles are always a continuing problem depending on what you grow...they like some things and will leave others untouched. Things they commonly like in my yard are roses, hibiscus, canna lillies and crape myrtles. They aren't a problem the entire year, only for a little while. Aphids are also an issue, especially on my daylilies. Our winters typically don't get cold enough to kill them off very well so you can really have a problem during a warm wet Spring. You'll never get rid of them completely but if you catch them early in the year and do something about it, whether an organic or inorganic approach, they can be properly controlled. The other nasty thing I was introduced to for the first time last year are the cucumber beetles. They are a big problem for Squash, cucumbers and other similar plants. Cucumbers especially can easily die from the bacteria transmitted when the beetles feed on them. I'll have to make some changes this year in order to grow a successful crop which will probably involve some kind of protective netting....last year they completely devastated my plants and I got nothing despite multiple replantings and spraying. The year before, I had an outstanding harvest with hundreds of cukes so this was very disappointing. I saw many threads posted on the subject in 2012 so I believe this was a massive problem last year in particular and not just locally. I guess environmental factors must have been very favorable for them. The rain can be unpredictable and vary widely from one county to the next, even within a county. Some people will get hit by every thunderstorm that rolls through the state and others can be in a severe drought for weeks or even months. If you have your own property you may have your own well which will be beneficial in that you probably won't be subject to watering restrictions from municipalities. However I would still suggest taking measures to effectively collect rainwater, grey water, etc...and use it as much as possible to offset the strain on your well pump. Things of great benefit would include rain barrels, gutters and cisterns, and the use of soaker hoses or drip irrigation. I started implementing drip irrgation last year and it's been a lifesaver, even though there's some initial financial investment. The plants are much happier during our hot dry spells. If you could plan ahead and devise a system to divert grey water from certain household applications so that it drains into your flower garden instead that would be awesome. You don't want to store grey water though, it should be used immediately. Rainwater on the other hand can be stored and used on your veggies and flowers when needed most. We also divert the condensation lines that are pumped out of our home's 2 A/C units into large collection barrels for use in my hydrangea bed. You would be amazed at how much water your A/C unit or multiple units can generate in the summer especially. Well that's a big enough novel for tonight. Good luck if you make the move!

It's pretty much all shrubs and perennials - no veggies or annuals! But lots of workhorses for your yard. Come and see us anyway!

Hi Y'all, Mmmmm! Sand plum jelly. That's a mouth-watering treat. Here in our part of Oklahoma, sand plums, also referred to around here as Chickasaw Plums (after all, our part of OK is the Chickasaw Nation) are predominantly fenceline trees. They often form extensive thickets, and I usually see them growing in poor sandy soil, poor clay soil and sometimes in pretty decent sandy loam. I'm not sure how they'd do on rocky soil as our part of Love County isn't very rocky, and the folks I know here on rocky soil don't have sand plums on their land. Here's what I can tell you about sand plums, and I'm no expert either. First of all, there are a lot of wild plums and the ones I knew as sand plums in Texas were Prunus texana and were somewhat dwarf, bushy plants with fruit that tended to ripen in June. The plums usually referred to in Oklahoma as sand plums are Prunus angustifolia and in Texas we usually called those thicket plums because of their tendency to sucker and form thickets over time. And, if you have wild black cherry, escarpment black cherry, harvard plum, creek plum, black cherry, chokecherries of flatwoods plum, they all are related to sand plum and they all grow the same way. Mexican plums are a little harder to start from seed. GROWING FROM SEED: To grow from seed, collect the plums from the trees after the fruit is fully filled-out and firm. Let the fruit get as ripe as you can but be sure to collect some before the birds strip the trees of all the fruit. Clean the seeds of pulp and let them air dry before you store them. You only want to air dry them for a short time--just a few hours if it is very humid or up to one day if the air is very dry. It is better to dry them indoors in moderate temperatures and out of direct sunlight because too much heat/sunlight can induce a tougher dormancy period. If you want, you can sow your summer to early-fall collected seed without drying, or you can cold-stratify the seed in the refrigerator. The idea temps for cold stratification of wild plum seed are 31 to 41 degrees according to Jill Nokes. If you want to plant in the fall, get your seeds into the beds in September so they have time for some after-ripening before cold weather arrives. You can winter sow plum seeds (pits) in late January to late February or you can plant them in a cold frame at about that time. Cold-stratified plum seeds germinate best when nighttime temps are in the 50s and daytime temps are in the 70s. GROWING FROM CUTTINGS: You can grow native plums from dormant hardwood cuttings, softwood cuttings, semihardwood cuttings or from root cuttings. The easiest way for most people (especially if you haven't raised trees or shrubs from cuttings before) is to use semihardwood cuttings taken in the early to mid summer. Take your semihardwood cuttings from the tips of branches, from new stems that are just barely beginning to turn woody at the base. If you cut them before they are beginning to turn woody, they are likely to rot before they root. Dip your cuttings into a rooting hormone (you can try willow water if you don't have or can't find rooting hormone) and place them in a tray of moist perlite/peat. Keep moist either by placing them under a mister or by misting them frequently. Some people place the tray of cuttings in a sealed plastic bag (like a giant zip-lock) to hold in moisture. Generally, they should begin to show root growth in 30 days or less. My favorite way for any of the native plums is to dig one up from the forest (for black cherries and Mexican plums) and transplant them into the yard. For sand plums, you often can sever a newer smaller sprout with a sharp spade and transplant it into a new area as long as the sprout or sucker has developed some root to sustain it once it is separated from the mother plant. To plant them, give them the same conditions in which they are found in the wild. Many native plants grow best in native (unamended) soil and with as little supplemental water as possible. Because these plants are adapted to survive in the real world in tough conditions, they can have trouble adjusting to enriched soil, and heavy fertilizer/water. One reason you don't transplant native plants into rich potting soil or heavily amended native soil is that the native plants are very susceptible to the kinds of bacteria common in such enriched soil since they have not been exposed to those bacteria in more lean, more arid native soil. Sandgrass, I am not sure how well they will do in rocky soil although most trees can grow roots that will slowly make their way down through the rocks and into deeper soil. I wouldn't amend the soil with anything because you can only amend a relatively small area and the tree is going to have to grow (over time as it enlarges) in the native soil anyway. When I plant/transplant a native plant, I try to make sure it has adequate water for the first 3 years of its life, but I don't give them extraordinary amounts of water. The key is to keep them moist enough that they don't go into transplant shock in the heat, but not so wet that the roots develop fungal diseases from the constant moistness. After a native plant has been in its location for 3 years, I don't give it any extra water. After three years, it has to survive on rainfall alone, unless we have the kind of prolonged drought that is causing trees to drop their leaves in the summer because of drought stress. As far as spacing, you can plant them at whatever distance you choose. After all, in the wild they sucker and form dense thickets so they are used to growing in close quarters. To make it easier to pick the plums, I'd plant them a good 8 or 10 feet apart so they aren't impossibly dense once they start to sucker and form thickets. If they do well, they'll get very thick over the years. If I had a choice, I'd plant them at a higher point in the landscape where they'd be likely to have better drainage. If your soil drains very quickly, as many rocky soils do, you could plant them in lower spots. The best location will be one that holds some moisture but not where water puddles for weeks on end. Hope this info helps. I can just about taste the sand plum jelly right now. Good luck with your trees. Dawn