Honeysuckle, Lonicera Sp.

Day 259: If I'd taken a minute to think about it, I would have realized why the nectar level in the hummingbird feeders wasn't dropping as rapidly as it was two weeks ago. The Honeysuckle (Lonicera) had come into bloom! My plant climbs up one corner of the garage where it generally goes unnoticed until some point when I step out in the back yard and am assailed with a waft of sweet scent. It's leggy and ragged, but then, I knew it would be like that when I planted it, and it should be noted that I did not plant it for myself; I planted it for the hummers. My "landscaping" (a term which is laughably inappropriate when discussing my yard) is like that: tatty, not structured in the least, floriferous but undisciplined, yet purposeful in its chaos. Call it my botanical "junk drawer," filled with useful things all tangled up with one another: cabled shrubby habitat, nuts-and-bolts nectar producers, twist-tie pollinator attractors and the occasional "why did I save this" item which never seems to get tossed. There's probably something in it which would suffice to patch a leak, connect two parts, fill a gap, take care of any except the most major repair. And there are even some things in it which improve on the existing measures...like Honeysuckle, drawing the hummers away from the sugar water in the feeders.