I thought I had an arrangement with my yard rabbit. The arrangement being, she can eat all she wants in the yard as long as she stays out of my garden beds. Well she has broken our unspoken agreement. She came with the house, so to be fair, she was here before me, but she’s not the one paying property taxes either. I love seeing wildlife in my yard and I expect some losses.
Sunflowers are a problem. Every year I try to grow them, all different kinds, and every year they snip those seedlings right off. So apparently sunflower seedlings are quite tasty. This year I decided I’d outsmart the rabbit. I got clear cups, cut the bottoms off, and put them around each place I buried a seed. So I have two sunflowers growing out of oh, twenty or so. 😉 Which is more than I’ve been getting. One of the two grew from under another plant, without the cup, so I’m pretty sure it was just missed. Some of the cups were not even disturbed.
Momma bunny is a good momma and has been having her babies in my flower beds. So I get adorable baby bunnies hiding out in my flowers and eating everything in sight. I think they are actually the sunflower thieves. I looked for her nest a few weeks ago but couldn’t find it. So last week I went to water the flowers and watered the babies. They went running every which way. Most of them stayed in the cover of the plants but one little guy ran into the yard. Then he froze. So I picked him up to put him back in the bed where he’d have some cover and he screamed. I don’t know if you’ve heard a baby bunny scream but it is awful. As soon as I put him in the garden bed he went running into the plants so he was safe and I felt like a horrible person. Momma bunny usually doesn’t pay a bit of attention to me, but she was in the yard frozen and giving me side eye hard. I apologized profusely. They were teeny babies, like just a few weeks. I found her nest up under the rose bush
I can chalk up the flowers as a loss. It’s frustrating but come on, baby bunnies! But, around back I have two raised vegetable beds. She usually doesn’t touch those, but this year she or her babies have been helping themselves to anything I put in there. So I lost all my melons, cucumbers, calendula, borage and tomato from one bed. The other one just has tomatoes and they’ve left that one alone. I grow everything from seed, as I like heirloom varieties, and I had some late seedlings since she ate the first batch. I put them out yesterday and today one of the two is snipped right off. So I still have one.
I just came in from watering plants. I’ve made a barricade around my brave little tomato seedling. I think it’s a black cherry tomato. I’ve gotten pieces of garden fencing and put them around it. The tomato cage is over top of it also, but that was already there. The fencing is flimsy but for now that’s what I can do. I’m thinking of making a little moat, and sharpening some twigs for an abatis. I could really geek out on this, but I should probably just let the bunny win.
Now, the squirrel digging up my pots is a different story.
Happy Memorial Day if you are in the US
Fever dream horror Burning eyes and warped wishes A djinn’s rage released | Cargo woke early Jade tendrils questing from pods Void the transport bay |