Pat,

I recommend Will Cook's website for ideas to get you started with the
birds/butterflies area:
http://www.duke.edu/~cwcook/

Anne Lurie
NE Raleigh


"Patskywriter" wrote in message
...
now that it's winter that gives me the chance to plan the transformation
of my
backyard from a dirtpit into an actual garden. when we moved here, the
backyard
was a swampy mess that sloped dangerously. that was fixed last year--when
the
guys were looking to dump dirt from the american tobacco project (in
durham)
they were invited to dump it in my backyard for free. (otherwise they
would
have had to pay to dump it somewhere.) we smoothed out the dirt with a
backhoe.
there's no way i could have afforded to buy that much dirt! mind you, the
dirt
is low quality, but that's OK. at least my backyard is level now.

we're REAL low on funds so we'll have to be clever. i plan to develop the
yard
in stages--an area for birds/butterflies, a tropical area, a small grassy
area,
a small ground-level deck, a series of raised beds for fruits/vegetables,
and a
pond.

anybody else out there with ambitious plans for their yards? maybe we can
share
ideas.

pat