Paper Wasps: Your New BFFs

...opean variant is more the wasp you will likely be dealing with in urban/suburban North America, because unlike their native counterparts, Euro wasps aren’t shy. They are the ones who will build a nest by your back door, or on the side of your mailbox. Paper wasps build those distinctive, easy to recognize papery nests made of many cells. There are other types of native wasps which build with different materials, such as mud. Honeybee colonies, of...

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Saturday Tweets: Danes and Their Garbage, Big Food and #BlackCatAppreciationDay

...15 Check out @NatGeo and their #rat story. https://t.co/PYnA7ARjmJ — SoCal Urban Wildlife (@SCUWMCouncil) August 20, 2015 Spectacular, swirling custom-built stone walls and furniture via @BoingBoing http://t.co/duIaDhKwPo — Root Simple (@rootsimple) August 21, 2015 Scientists study the impact of the drought on California's giant sequoias http://t.co/xduhylrmol via @SFGate — Root Simple (@rootsimple) August 21, 2015 Latest Video: how to grill s...

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What does the loving landscape look like?

...first, was transformed by nature into a sort of secret park known only to urban explorers–and then, beginning in 2006, was refashioned into a much loved public attraction by a team of architects and designers. If you can get your hands on Walking the High Line by Joel Sternfeld, it’s well worth a look to see how nature had gained a strong foothold in on the train tracks before the designers moved in, even though she had to work high in the air on...

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Flowers from Vegetables

...the birds will move in. Of course this means that I’m “wasting space” and making my garden “unproductive” but the rewards outweigh any inconvenience. New gardeners are often surprised to see what amazing flowers different vegetables make. People with no connection to food plants whatsoever may not even know that vegetables make flowers, so it’s fun to show them a carrot flower, a squash blossom, a bean flower. My new favorite garden flower comes...

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