Need tips for attracting birds bees butterflies & bats

[DJboutit]

I live in Houston Tx my back yard backs up to a bayou my back yard is like

1/4 to 1/2 acre. Need good tips or ideas for attracting bird bees butterflies & bats to my back yard. Right now I have 2 bird feeders bird bath bird house in my yard the plants I have are 2 big tress 1 medium size tree some bushes small vine lots of small plants. What elese can I do to attarct wild life to my back yard I am not looking for squerals.

[Paul E. Lehmann]

Convince the government that it needs to do something about the horrible air pollution problem in Houston and perhaps the wild life will come back.

[John A. Keslick, Jr.]

I desiced to start a tree biology list.

We will see how it goes.

Sincerely,

John A. Keslick, Jr. Tree Biologist

of so-called TREE EXPERTS who do not understand TREE BIOLOGY!

[John A. Keslick, Jr.]

I desiced to start a tree biology list.

We will see how it goes.

Sincerely,

John A. Keslick, Jr. Tree Biologist

of so-called TREE EXPERTS who do not understand TREE BIOLOGY!

[Doug Kanter]

Get yourself a butterfly bush. My new house came with one and it's amazing. There were so many butterflies & bees around it (until the cold weather arrived) that it looked like something out of a Disney movie: animated bug banquet. However, if anyone in the household is terrified of bees, don't plant it near any of the doors to the house. Mine attracted bees the size of golf balls. I still managed to weed around the bush during feeding time without being bothered. A couple of times, the bees smacked into my arm in their rush to get back to the feast. I think they're like little kids rushing to the piñata at a birthday party - they don't notice anything else.

Oh....and the flowers smell terrific.

[dps]

Foraging honeybees aren't normally agressive (at least in New England -- I don't know anything about the african strains, which are not winter hardy up here). They will sting if trapped or if they feel threatened. However, you can brush them off flowers with your finger without any problem as long as you allow them a way to escape.

When they get old and crochety, they are relegated to hive guard duty, where they will threaten intruders to their personal space.

[FACE]

Plant some physiotegia (sp) commonly known as "mother-in-law's tongue" (?) Within three years you will have more physiotegia than you want and more bumblebees (the cute little feller's!) than you can shake the proverbial stick at -- I do in the fall and though I am sure that they will sting if cornered and bothered I have literally slapped them out of the way.

(You know that irritating "Nexium" commercial about the purple pill that ran incessantly a while back? I am pretty sure that the purple field they were in was physiotegia -- at least it sure did look like about half of my backyard, where I planted a dozen *single* physiotegia plants about 5 years ago.)

FACE

[jjp]

Houston's air pollution problem was with ground-level ozone ONLY. According to the EPA, there are SIX components or kinds of air pollution, ozone being just ONE of them.

http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:hMu2WJNsGqAJ:

"According to EPA, Los Angeles' air still is ranked in a poorer category than the air in Houston. While Houston violates the federal standard for ozone, Los Angeles violates the standards for ozone, carbon monoxide, and particulate matter."

"In some ways, calling Houston America's smoggiest city misrepresented the relative quality of air in the two cities. Los Angeles' air is worse than Houston's in other categories."

More recent info on ozone violations:

Areas with the Worst Ozone Air Pollution

1 LOS ANGELES-RIVERSIDE-ORANGE COUNTY, CA 2 FRESNO, CA 3 BAKERSFIELD, CA 4 VISALIA- -PORTERVILLE, CA 5 HOUSTON-BAYTOWN-HUNTSVILLE, TX CMSA 6 MERCED, CA 7 SACRAMENTO-ARDEN-ARCADE--TRUCKEE, CA-NV 8 HANFORD-CORCORAN, CA 9 KNOXVILLE-SEVIERVILLE-LA FOLLETTE, TN 10 DALLAS-FORT WORTH, TX CMSA

And overall air quality:

of days in 2000-2002 when air quality was unhealthy

1. Riverside-San Bernardino, Ca. 445 days
2. Fresno, Ca. 421
3. Bakersfield, Ca. 409
4. Los Angeles-Long Beach, Ca. 255
5. Sacramento, Ca. 163
6. Pittsburgh, Penn. 134
7. Knoxville, Tenn. 109
8. Birmingham, Al. 100
9. Houston, Tx. 94
10. Baltimore, Md. 93

And particle pollution:

".... 1999-2001 EPA data, do not take into account a pollutant that's considered more dangerous than smog -- tiny particles of soot that can lodge deep in the lungs and cause heart problems and even death."

Areas Most Polluted by Year-Round Particle Pollution

1 LOS ANGELES-LONG BEACH-RIVERSIDE, CA 2 VISALIA-PORTERVILLE, CA 3 BAKERSFIELD, CA 4 FRESNO-MADERA, CA 5 PITTSBURGH-NEW CASTLE, PA 6 DETROIT-WARREN-FLINT, MI 7 ATLANTA-SANDY SPRINGS-GAINESVILLE, GA 8 CLEVELAND-AKRON-ELYRIA, OH 9 HANFORD-CORCORAN, CA 10 BIRMINGHAM-HOOVER-CULLMAN, AL (Houston is not on the list of 26 cities)

[paghat]

Look up "bat box" on google & you will find patterns on how to build & where best to mount a bat nesting box, or many vendors selling bat boxes.

-paghat the ratgirl