Folklore or Fact

Yesterday morning I looked across the valley at the grey skies.  Overhead, clouds were moving quickly and the air felt heavy. The valley was covered in a fine mist.

The cows - most of them before I ran for my camera - were lying in the field across the county road. English folklore has long insisted that cows lying in a field indicated that it was going to rain. Sure enough, it did rain - but just a bit. Not the deluge I was hoping for.

But curious as ever, I had to check it out - where else but Wikipedia? So according to researchers at the University of Arizona (I think ) cows prefer to lie down when it's cold but stand when it's hot. The researchers reasoned that standing allows their body heat to dissipate more easily if they're standing. They appear to lie down when the air pressure lowers which often is accompanied by lower temperatures as well as storms and rain.
 
Learn something new every day!

And I got some spectacular photos because of the little bit of rain.

I thought this rose looked as if it was studded with diamonds when I saw the photograph - the tiny drops of water caught by the flash of the camera...didn't see them with the naked eye.
And once again, Gaia gave me a beautiful sunset before it clouded over again. May you have similar gifts come your way today.

Summer roses

One of the flowers in my garden that I truly love is the rose. I have several different varieties. I don't know their names and I don't know the name of the little green worm that has made a tasty meal of their leaves. But I do know that my father and both my grandfathers loved roses as well, as do my sons and my brother.

So I dusted my plants with something called plant doctor to get rid of the little green worms and had immediate remorse because I hate killing things... and so have washed off a lot of the dust which is so old I doubt it would work anyway and am going to use a soap solution.

But here's what "Yahoo Answers" offers as it's best answer to what are the little green worms that are devouring my rose bushes: Not trying to be a wise guy, but they're Baby moths.

If you want to get rid of them, buy the insecticide specified to target them and read the label carefully to ensure optimal effectiveness.

If you care enough about the environment to ensure the poison doesn't eventually work it's way into our already strained clean water supply, (and it will) wait a few days and their natural predators (wasps) will appear and kill them for you. The wasps that target them are not aggressive like the ones that build those huge bowling ball sized paper nests. They live in small holes in rotting dead wood. You can make a few your self by drilling 1/2 inch holes in a section of 2X4 or a branch you find lying around in your yard. Hang them approximately 50-100 feet away from your house and the wasps will help you out. If allergic (Pick-em off by hand or use the poison responsibly)

I would pick them off by hand until the wasps figure out where they are.

Source(s):

Had the same question a few years ago, did the research and built a couple of simple and easy to make wasp habitats in my back yard. The wasps won't bother you and it's fascinating to watch them hover around the plant then suddenly drop down on one of the little critters and fly away with it.

*** ***

So there we go! Now, I've learned something valuable, and pass on this tip to you...and now I'm going out to the garden to wash the white stuff off and get rid of it, probably onto a brush pile with lots of water so it will be so dilute it won't hurt anything... 

And - I'm going to enjoy the rose blooms! Hope you have a "rose-y" day!