Gardening
Design a Bird-friendly Landscape
Evergreens, like this yew, provide year-round appeal and shelter for birds.
Photo courtesy of MelindaMyers.com
Temperature extremes, drought and storms take a toll on our landscapes. Sometimes a bit of pruning, proper care and patience is all that is needed to help plants recover. Other times, plants need replacing. It is always sad to lose a favorite plant. The memories, time and money invested are lost, but it presents an opportunity to grow something new.
Consider creating a bird-friendly landscape when selecting replacements for failing and dead plants. Working with nature is a great way to support birds without the use of feeders.
Look for seed, berry and nectar producing plants that attract songbirds. You will enjoy the color and motion these birds add to your landscape. Plus, 96% of terrestrial North American birds feed upon insects, helping you manage garden pests.
Plant bird-friendly flowers, shrubs, and trees in clusters whenever possible. This creates an impressive display in the landscape and allows birds to gather food more efficiently and waste less energy traveling between plants.
Select a variety of plants to ensure both seasonal and year-round birds have plenty of food. Include a mixture of plants that provide seeds, berries, or nectar from spring through fall. These plants are nature's birdfeeders, eliminating the need to clean and fill traditional feeders.
Include native trees, shrubs, and flowers whenever they are suited to the growing conditions in your yard. Native plants, birds and insects have co-evolved over time, making them a great source of food and shelter for native birds. Audubon's Native Plant Database provides lists of plants suited to your location.
Consider plants with year-round appeal. Evergreens provide screening and a backdrop for other plants and shelter for the birds. Junipers come in a variety of sizes and shapes and tolerate hot dry conditions once established. Choose hemlocks for those shadier locations. They require moist well-drained soil and shelter from winter wind and sun.
Deciduous trees and shrubs--those that lose their leaves in winter--can provide multiple seasons of beauty with flowers, fruit, fall color and interesting bark. Many of these also provide shelter and food for songbirds. Serviceberries have multiple seasons of beauty and produce edible fruit you and the birds will enjoy in June. Dogwoods, including red twig and pagoda, have flowers for pollinators and late summer fruit for the songbirds. Winterberry is an excellent source of winter food. You will need at least one male for every one to five female plants for pollination and fruit to form. Grow these in full sun to light shade and moist acidic soil.
Reduce the risk of injury and the inconvenience of accidentally knocking out power, cable or other utilities while making bird-friendly additions to the landscape. Contact Diggers Hotline at least three business days before you get started planting. Just call 811 or file a request online at https://call811.com/811-In-Your-State. They will contact all the appropriate companies who will mark the location of their underground utilities in the designated work area. August 11 has been declared 811 Day to remind everyone to call 811 prior to any digging project.
Your efforts now to welcome birds into your landscape are sure to provide much beauty and enjoyment for years to come.
Melinda Myers has written more than 20 gardening books, including The Midwest Gardener's Handbook, 2nd Edition and Small Space Gardening. She hosts The Great Courses "How to Grow Anything" DVD series and the nationally-syndicated Melinda's Garden Moment TV & radio program. Myers is a columnist and contributing editor for Birds & Blooms magazine. Her web site is www.MelindaMyers.com.
Antiques
Antique and Collectibles Auction News
There's been plenty of antique, collectibles, and auction news hot off the press this summer, starting with some shipwrecked treasures heading to auction this fall. USA Today reports that items from an 1857 shipwreck heading to the block include "a pair of work pants and wedding rings to letters and a first edition of 'The Count of Monte Cristo.'" The Steamship Central America was traveling from San Francisco to New York carrying many passengers who became rich during the California Gold Rush, meaning the ship was also transporting tons of gold. A hurricane off the Carolina Coast sank the ship, killing 475 people and sending its precious cargo 7,000 feet below sea level. USA today report that the ship sinking marked "the greatest economic disaster in U.S. maritime history and contributed to a global panic." Items were recovered from the wreck in the 1990s and again in 2014. Many of the estimates are in the hundreds of thousands and millions of dollars.
Here on land, online bidding is open for a bitter 1971 letter sent from John Lennon to Paul McCartney. TMZ reports that the letter came in response to an interview McCartney did with Melody Maker, a British music magazine. According to Ultimate Classic Rock and Culture, Paul wanted only the four Beatles present when they signed a paper agreeing to a split. Lennon's letter to McCartney read, "Maybe there's an answer there somewhere ... but for the millionth time in these past few years, I repeat, what about the TAX?" Along with the tax issue, Lennon also took offense with the fact that McCartney wanted just the four Beatles to meet. He wrote "I thought you'd have understood BY NOW that I'm JOHNANDYOKO." The auction estimate for the letter is $30,000.
A Honus Wagner T206 baseball tobacco card once again set an auction record recently. The Wagner card is considered the Holy Grail or Mona Lisa of baseball cards. Wagner didn't want his likeness depicted on tobacco cards because he thought they would encourage tobacco use by young fans. Major League Baseball's website reports that "there are thought to be only 50-60 copies of the card in existence, making it one of the rarest sports cards in the world." In August of last year, a Wagner T206 card sold for $6.6 million. This Wagner card sold for $7.25 million last month.
The jacket that Buzz Aldrin wore to the moon also recently set a record, fetching the highest price for a jacket ever sold for at action. The jacket featured Aldrin's name and an Apollo 11 patch. Forbes reports that it was the only garment worn to the moon that was ever available at auction. The previous record for an American space flown artifact was a lunar dust bag which brought $1.8 million in 2017. The previous record for a jacket was for the one worn by Michael Jackson in the Thriller video which also sold for $1.8 million in 2011. Aldrin's jacket exceeded the $1 to $2 million estimate, selling for $2.8 million last month. A rare space item selling like truly only happens once in a blue moon.
We are still accepting consignments for our upcoming fall multi-estates auction. Other events this fall include my "Evaluating your Antiques" class at Bay Path high school in Charlton on September 13th, an appraisal event at the Townsend Historical Society on October 15th, an appraisal event at the Worcester Senior Center from 9:30 am to 11:30 am on October 18th and an appraisal event for the Leicester Historical Society on November 5th. Please visit our website www.centralmassauctions.com for links to upcoming events.
Contact us at: Wayne Tuiskula Auctioneer/Appraiser Central Mass Auctions for Antique Auctions, Estate Sales and Appraisal Services www.centralmassauctions.com (508-612- 6111) info@centralmassauctions.com