Patrick, thanks for your sympathies. We registered 101 here in Raleigh, NC yesterday and it is supposed to be the same today. Last night I told my sister I heard it was supposed to be cooler this weekend, and she replied, yeah, 88...real cool. It sure is bringing the birds to my birdbath and I have had lots of goldfinches drinking out of my ant moat and the well in my hummzinger.

Patrick, we feel for you - mid 80s. Remember, drink lots of liquids, and don't overdue it. We hear that heat stoke is a common problem for 2nd generation northwesterners when the temperatures get into the upper 60s and above.

On a less serious note, your garden sounds great. It's been years since I've been in Washington, but I recall that your mild temperatures really brought out the color in flowers, and that plants tended to look healthy all season.

Currently the temperature in south Jersey is a couple of degrees under one hundred with humidity around 60%. The weather people talk about something called the heat index, a combination of temperature and humidity. It's their way of letting us know how much we're suffering - damn those weather ladies with their fixed smiles.

Ward, "damn those weather ladies with thier fixed simles'. Right out of a Jimmy Buffett song.

Just in from starting a sprinkler. Hot! Hot! Hot!

One good thing is it doesn't seem to be bothering the hummingbirds. They are all over the place(Not like at Frank's) but enough to keep me happy.

We are just under a hundred here in the city of brotherly love - but that's just the "official" temp at the airport. When you're downtown, the temp can get into the 120° Fs because of all the brick and concrete and steel and asphalt.... and when that stuff heats up, it takes quite a bit of time to cool off in the evenings too.... :-(

Even though we have had hotter temps in the past (like 2002 & 1999), we still broke an all-time record for electric usage ever in the city yesterday. The previous record was ~8100 MW for a day's usage. They indicate that 1 MW can power 1000 homes. Yesterday they officially recorded 8,329 MW of usage. Just checked for today and they said that as of 2pm, we actually surpassed yesterday's record for usage, so when all is said and done today, it will be incredible! This is attributed to all the growth and building in the city (alot of new homes and skyscrapers that have to be cooled and an increased demand for the power to do it).

But the "cold front" is on its way. Some forecasters here are actually calling it a "cool front" because by the time it gets here, the temps aren't going to really cool all that much. It'll basically take us back to "average" for this time of year, which is low - mid '80s and scour out some of the humidity while dropping the dewpoints out of the 70s. lol

But... my little one came today a couple times. I didn't see her yesterday, although I wasn't constantly looking so I may have missed her. I saw her pecking at the unopened blooms on a Scarlet Runner bean too. LOL

Record heat for the mountains of NC - terrible for people with allergies, and I have had an ear that is "out" for ten days despite antibiotics - drove down the mountain to Greenville, SC, today which did it no good - but I always have a little hummer - I water every evening when I get home, and the hummer appears as soon as I walk back onto my porch - sometimes male, sometimes female - seriously going at the potted plants - not much interest in the feeders - but we are all just crawling around, we feel so terrible - low 80's this weekend - going back to the doctor tomorrow - fortunately I live in a tiny two room cottage, and the window unit does its thing, and does not cost much - but I let the cats out onto the porch, where they love to salivate over the birds (but ignoring the hummingbirds) and they say no thank you, and go right right back inside. They have more sense than I do - I sit on the porch and let the perspiration pour down my face while I watch for the hummers....

Ward.. LOL - and don't forget their "perky" hairdos.. I've had "humidity Limp" now for 3 weeks.....even gel leaves me looking like a wet dishrag LOL
Take care all... and STAY COOL.......

after a week of 98F+ and intense uv sunshine, our heat wave finally broke today (which we would have thought hot 2 months ago) with a high of 88 and humidity and dewpoint so high it thunderstormed on and off all afternoon. at work, we all remarked how comfortable it actually felt today.

jenny's right about the urban heat factor. on monday, which was 100F, we put a thermometer in full sunshine directly on the asphalt in the parking lot at work (downtown) and it read 124F!

Wheweeee! Hot summer nights. Just right for running nekked in the backyard....that IS what a moon garden is for, isn't it?!!

I was just out to check my datura moonflower. It has a bud that should have opened this evening, but I discovered the leaves were badly wilted. I gave it a big drink of water and will check the flower again in about an hour. I can see I'm going to have to water some of the potted plants twice a day, or move them where they'll get afternoon shade.

I reported earlier that I hadn't seen any hummers lately, but about 2PM today one came visiting the hanging fuchsia baskets on my back porch while I was standing nearby. I'll bet I'd find some activity in the backyard if I'd get out there around 6AM. Hmmm...I'll have to think about that. Running nekkid in the moon garden at midnight sound more appealing...heh heh.

Patrick

Right, Standard. We think of 100 degree temps as just "hot" -- we didn't know it was a heat wave.

The trouble in my little corner of the world is the drought we have been experiencing this year. We have only had two good rains and one small shower since the end of April. The weather forecast said the "cold front" would bring rain as well, but we didn't get a single drop. So it will be dragging 4 water sprinklers around every hour and a half for me, all weekend long.

We had rain to our north and to our south as the front passed through, but narry a drop at our house. It was actually a little cold at dawn today. It was really difficult to get in the car and drive into Philadelphia to the office. Mornings like this should be declared holidays.

I sure hope everyone gets some decent rain in the second half of the summer.
100F is just business as usual in mississippi, huh, oubliette?
I'll take this over the winters in my native rochester, ny any time, and have for 14 years.
any running around au naturel in tennessee, however, is going to get you chiggers and ticks and fleas, patrick!

Even when it gets over 90 during the day, night temps usually drop down to the low 60's so it's not too bad around here. Some of my "full-sun" fuchsias that were ok in the 80's dropped buds when it got to successive 90's days, though. The one that's come through the heat unscathed is is Nici's Findlings, still going strong in full sun.

Well the temps dropped off nicely here late yesterday afternoon and overnight and it is nice out today. There were some awful gusty winds when the front came through yesterday along with some horizontal rain, but barely enough to moisten the ground. There was alot of lightning too.

The heat really did in my Fuchsia magellanica 'Aurea' and it dropped just about every leaf, although almost all of its flowers were and still are fine. It is a plant that I bought last year and overwintered inside (it is supposedly hardy in the ground to zone 7 or so). My little one had actually sampled some of them earlier, although it was a bit awkward for her to get up underneath of them. LOL It is resprouting though so it should be okay.

I know the stress of the heat is going to show itself on my plants sooner or later. One of my lilacs is already suffering for it. :-(

Jenny That's funny about the heat wave of 1999 and 2002 I remember those years so well, summer of 2002 I had more hummers than I ever had before! it was a wonderful hot dry year and my salvia greggii's went crazy and so did the hummer population in my yard that summer and fall when the rest of the salvias and the calliope showed up. This is a hot summer but I have more hummingbirds than I ever had before and I have flowers blooming that I have never seen bloom! salvia discolor it's beautiful! Salvia urica came back from last year it's a dream salvia over 7 feet tall blue and it puts guaranitica to shame! Also I didn't plant any salvia splendens this year at all or salvia coccinea and they are taken over my yard! along with the greggii's Can you tell I am in salvia hummer heaven here in my hummer haven. It was beautiful yesterday and today and sunday too I didn't want to leave my yard! Now if we could have a mild winter like dare I say we had in 2001-2002 it was a banner year in my winter flower garden only one or two snowfalls and they melted the next day. Sarah

Well I'll never forget the summer of 2002 because that's when I ended up unexpectantly hosting a pair of pigeon babies. I had a couple 100-post threads on the Balcony Forum documenting their progress... LOL

They went from this in mid June 2002:

{{gwi:1226}}

To this ( 3 years ago today):

{{gwi:2646}}

Let me tell you that having a hummer is much more fascinating, although watching these 2 grow up out there was an interesting experience. LOL

I don't think I've ever seen pigeon chicks before very interesting. About the other night with all that wind my trumpet vine and heavy arbor were knocked over. This is the second time this happened. In 2003 when we had two tornados and some bad hurricanes in November my original arbor got knocked down and completly twisted up like it had been in a blender. Sarah

Sarah - I think most people haven't seen the babies. It's always been a standard joke about people never seeing baby pigeons. But then I guess that's because they tend to nest high up on buildings and grow up so fast. l know there are folks who raise show pigeons as a hobby so they obviously see them. The above 2 were born around the middle - end of June and were mature and flying by the beginning of August (they learned by practicing to flap while jumping off my larger containers... LOL).

One main difference about them vs the hummer is that the male and female are a mated pair and both help to raise the babies. The mother will leave the nest during the day and get some food for herself while the father watches the nest from his perch nearby. If the babies start screaming, he'll go get them some food and feed them and check on them, then he'll go back out on his perch and "guard the nest". LOL At night, the mother comes back to the nest and sleeps with them, including doing some feeding and the father will sleep somewhere else for the night. It was interesting to watch this whole dynamic unfold.

This was mom and one of her babies.

Dad was out on the ledge.... "guarding". LOL

Sorry to hear about the damage you had from the storms and tornadoes. When there's heat like that, any cold front coming through can produce some nasty storms and tornadoes. I remember that tornado that went through Morris Arboretum that's not that far up the street from me and they lost something like 200 trees. And the remnants of the hurricanes were pretty rough (I think it was Isabel then?). Even last year this time, we had some bad flooding rains. Monday will be the 1-year anniversary of a particularly bad torrential rain event where we got something like 6" of rain in an hour and it washed out Cresheim Valley Drive (which they finally repaired and opened a couple months ago). Then it happened again the following week I think.

Such is Mother Nature!

I remember that. That's fascinating about the pigeons they are such good parents. Sarah

Well, the NE and MidAtlantic are about to get really socked this week with heat and humidity (more than usual)... any suggestions to helping our gardens cope (veggie and perennials)... since I have many new plantings, I watered very deeply the last two days (we haven't but an 1/2 inch of rain in my area in two weeks), and I'll shade some things. Any other suggestions? And I'll make sure the birds have plenty of water...
suz