To scare a murder of crows

The first visitor was a rabbit. I chased it out, shored up the fence, and thought all was well. Well, that is, except for the black beans planted right next to the fence opening. They'd been nibbled to the ground.

Next, just as the black beans were showing their little leafy heads above ground again, I found a big guy nicknamed Chuck Wood napping in my garden. After he left, I shored up the chicken wire again and vowed never, never to leave the gate open overnight again. Never.

Later, in the evening of the same day that Chuck visited, I found four crows nibbling on something on or near the pepper plants. Crows! Big ones! They scolded from the next yard as I waved and shouted enough to chase them away.


All right, already!! I've had enough! I love wildlife as much as the next eco-warrior, but this is MY GARDEN!! It's food for my family! It's my contribution to the family fridge! It's the fresh organic veggies that will keep all of us healthy as long as the produce it produces may last!


Solution? I'm trying these. Old CDs, Windows 3.11 (isn't that concept scary in itself?), now hang in the wind. Their shiny and strange reflection may deter those wild ones who might otherwise be attracted by the green goodies growing here.





I used the inner support from an old campaign sign to place a few CDs close to the former rabbit entry.

Maybe now I can weed around the black bean plants -- and they might actually come up. Haha. A gardener can dream, a gardener can always dream.

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Critters. Darn critters.

I was dragging the hose out toward the garden one warm and dry day when I saw movement behind the tomatoes and beans. Quick movement for an obviously large creature, it was followed by a "bang, bang" as the large furry thing crashed against the chicken wire that surrounds my vegetable plot. The wire fencing gave, then bounced back as the larger-than expected animal threw itself against the wall again and again.

Rabbit? Nope. It was one of these.

Yes, the common and destructive garden woodchuck. This one wasn't chucking wood. I think I actually interrupted its naptime and caused a bit of panic; they're usually more nocturnal critters that come out at dusk.

You're dying to know how I reacted, right? I let out an OMG screech to the tune of "How did you get in there??!!" and then ran in the house to grab La Petite and a camera. By the time we got out there, it had scratched enough of a hole to slide under the fence and escape. I'm glad it got out, despite my lack of Candid Camera documentation. Those teeth were big!

My next challenge is this: shore up the fencing. I think it got in when I forgot to close the gate overnight. Now it's time to make sure I close the gate (yeah, yeah, yeah) and make sure this enormous rodent (bigger than my bunny Buttercup!!) never finds an entrance again. Begone, Furball!!

The real ones are not this cute, believe me.

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Garden mistakes and the courage to solve them

The road to you-know--where is paved with good intentions. In the case of my garden's Bunny Food section, my good intentions ended up with too little "pavement." I reuse boards from an old fence and old deck to create stepping stone style walkways. In my quest to plant more in the existing space, I made the walkways too small. That's the bad news.

The good news is also bad news. I planted two kinds of spinach, but only one came up. See the space between the parsley and the spinach? Weeds and two too-small boards, that's all. the good news is that left me space to put down a wider walkway. I pulled out the boards that held back the raised beds and placed them over the weeds and dirt.

Now I have more room to walk, more room to kneel while harvesting or weeding, and I don't have to weed or water the portion under the boards. The boards themselves will keep the bad seeds down. Next year I'll know better. For now, change is good. Parsley on the left, spinach on the right, stepping "stones" in the middle: it works for me!

Next on the to-do list: harvest lettuce. Salads, tacos, bunny food, or all three?

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Strawberry Dump Cake

I find recipes all over the Internet. This one was on Eco-Women: Protectors of the Planet! This group blog features environmental posts and suggestions and tips for being more eco-conscious. Cooking and baking local foods while they're in season is a great way to think globally and act locally. Here's a recipe for strawberries from their Enviro-Girl.

Enviro Girl's Strawberry Dump Cake

Fill the bottom of a 9 x 11 casserole pan with 4-6 cups clean, sliced strawberries.
Top with ½ cup butter, cut into slices.
Dump on one plain yellow cake mix.
Top THAT with another ½ cup of butter cut into slices. Bake at 350 for 35 minutes.

Serve with ice cream (homemade, if you can) or whipped cream. Coffee on the side, of course. Yum!

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