Red, White and Green.......

My poinsettia has lost a lot of leaves from the bottom but it is still alive.  I have a hard time keeping them alive in the house in the soil that they are planted.  I don't think it is totally soilless but it is hard to know how much to water them. If the soil was normal I could feel it and know if it is dry.  I don't want to replant it just yet and put it in real dirt because it will lose the color petals on top.  I just hope I can keep it going one more month and then I will replant it.



I had an inquiry about my previous post about the birds behaviors at my feeder.  I did some research on the subject matter that I was uncertain about and didn't want to write off of the top of my thinning haired head.

 As an answer to one of my blogger friends I inserted a stock picture of a purple finch.   This bird didn't live in Iowa until the late 1980's.  I am not sure where it was from but it has spread from the both  coast lines towards middle of America.  I see them once in a while and I confuse them with the bird below.  They are so different looking but since they come to the feeder seldom also anytime I see a red head I think purple finch. It probably is a house finch.

 The house finch seen at right has also migrated into Iowa the last 25 years or so and it is starting to crowd out the sparrows as well as finches. We have a lot of them in the north end of town where the grain elevator is located.  If I had a feeder there and lived in that area there would be large flocks of them hitting the feeder.  In the south of town we may see one or two maybe twice all winter.