Competing for Food
The local animals and insects want to eat the things I've planted. We put up nine-foot deer netting around the entire garden and placed logs against the base to make it more difficult to dig under. Even so, a groundhog has managed to find its way in and has been munching away on things. It ate the tops off of the new sunflowers I planted two weeks ago:
It ate the leaves on my cucumber plants:
And it ate the leaves off my broccoli:
It dug an enormous hole under the deer fencing and logs, right in the middle of my asparagus bed.
After I saw the hole and the damage yesterday, I stayed in the garden awhile to weed. Then, while I was on the far side, I glanced over in the direction of the hole and saw the critter sticking its head out. It was, as I had thought, a groundhog. I yelled at it and it retreated. I had my camera with me so I got a bit closer and snapped a picture:
The damn thing had retreated, but only just inside its hole.
M. and I talked about what to do. We'd discovered that a small animal (i.e., not a deer) had been eating our plants a few days earlier. There was a ten-foot or so section of fencing around the gate that had different kind of fencing with holes larger than the deer netting. I thought something was sneaking in through them so I added a layer of chicken wire. The next day was the day I discovered the hole dug under the fence. I filled the hole in. The next day, it was back.
So, hmm. My first thought was that the critter had burrowed under the fence to get into the garden. But my second thought was that it came into the garden before I blocked off the openings with chicken wire and that it might be burrowing to get out of the garden. I found a few other attempted burrows leading out of the garden that had been aborted when the critter's tunnel butted up against the deer fencing.
I had a groundhog with a burrow and den underneath the barn in the spring. The dog fussed and dug at its entrance every time he had a change and eventually the groundhog stopped coming around. So I decided to put the dog to use. I showed him the burrow in the garden and he immediately stuck his hole head in the opening. Then he proceeded to dig like a maniac, throwing soil in all directions. I stopped him after just a minute because he was making a huge mess but I'm hoping it was enough to give the varmint second thoughts about my garden being a safe place to make a home and find food.
Last night M. covered the hole with chicken wire and weighted it down with bricks. After I finishing writing this, I'll go see what good that did.
Those are not the only critters fighting me for food. For weeks I've been picking striped cucumber beetles off of the cucumber and squash plants. So far their population has remained steady and they haven't done too much damage. Then yesterday I discovered new bugs on the potato plants. A little googling revealed that they are Colorado potato beetles. Unfortunately, it seems that they are difficult to control as they have grown resistant to most pesticides and their natural predators aren't sufficient to keep their population in check. Today I'll pinch off the leaves they're eating and throw them in some soapy water. I doubt I'll be able to eradicate them but I may be able to limit their damage.
All of this competition for my garden is leading me to question my commitment to non-violence toward animals and insects. When I've had small hobby gardens I was reluctant to kill the bugs or varmints that munched on my plants even when they did some serious damage and threatened production. I weighed killing the pest against the inconvenience of having to buy a few more vegetables at the store or farmer's market, rather than getting them from my garden and decided it wasn't worth taking the lives of the pests. Now, however, I'm counting on our garden to provide us with food that we'll eat all year. I want to rely on my garden to sustain us, rather than the grocery store. I've invested considerable resources as well into the garden, both money and labor. This changes my evaluation dramatically. Under these circumstances, I am much less reluctant to kill the critters that threaten my food.
I also realized that even if I don't eat meat, the production of vegetables requires killing of animals and insects. When vegetables are bought at the store, that killing isn't visible and therefore usually doesn't get considered in our decisions about what we ought to eat. But when you have a garden and rely on it for food, the competition for resources is in-your-face. You destroy habitat when you clear and till the ground, and you need to control animal and insect populations on your crops if you want them to grow to maturity. Some living things must die for us to live. That much is unavoidable.
It ate the leaves on my cucumber plants:
And it ate the leaves off my broccoli:
After I saw the hole and the damage yesterday, I stayed in the garden awhile to weed. Then, while I was on the far side, I glanced over in the direction of the hole and saw the critter sticking its head out. It was, as I had thought, a groundhog. I yelled at it and it retreated. I had my camera with me so I got a bit closer and snapped a picture:
M. and I talked about what to do. We'd discovered that a small animal (i.e., not a deer) had been eating our plants a few days earlier. There was a ten-foot or so section of fencing around the gate that had different kind of fencing with holes larger than the deer netting. I thought something was sneaking in through them so I added a layer of chicken wire. The next day was the day I discovered the hole dug under the fence. I filled the hole in. The next day, it was back.
So, hmm. My first thought was that the critter had burrowed under the fence to get into the garden. But my second thought was that it came into the garden before I blocked off the openings with chicken wire and that it might be burrowing to get out of the garden. I found a few other attempted burrows leading out of the garden that had been aborted when the critter's tunnel butted up against the deer fencing.
I had a groundhog with a burrow and den underneath the barn in the spring. The dog fussed and dug at its entrance every time he had a change and eventually the groundhog stopped coming around. So I decided to put the dog to use. I showed him the burrow in the garden and he immediately stuck his hole head in the opening. Then he proceeded to dig like a maniac, throwing soil in all directions. I stopped him after just a minute because he was making a huge mess but I'm hoping it was enough to give the varmint second thoughts about my garden being a safe place to make a home and find food.
Last night M. covered the hole with chicken wire and weighted it down with bricks. After I finishing writing this, I'll go see what good that did.
Those are not the only critters fighting me for food. For weeks I've been picking striped cucumber beetles off of the cucumber and squash plants. So far their population has remained steady and they haven't done too much damage. Then yesterday I discovered new bugs on the potato plants. A little googling revealed that they are Colorado potato beetles. Unfortunately, it seems that they are difficult to control as they have grown resistant to most pesticides and their natural predators aren't sufficient to keep their population in check. Today I'll pinch off the leaves they're eating and throw them in some soapy water. I doubt I'll be able to eradicate them but I may be able to limit their damage.
All of this competition for my garden is leading me to question my commitment to non-violence toward animals and insects. When I've had small hobby gardens I was reluctant to kill the bugs or varmints that munched on my plants even when they did some serious damage and threatened production. I weighed killing the pest against the inconvenience of having to buy a few more vegetables at the store or farmer's market, rather than getting them from my garden and decided it wasn't worth taking the lives of the pests. Now, however, I'm counting on our garden to provide us with food that we'll eat all year. I want to rely on my garden to sustain us, rather than the grocery store. I've invested considerable resources as well into the garden, both money and labor. This changes my evaluation dramatically. Under these circumstances, I am much less reluctant to kill the critters that threaten my food.
I also realized that even if I don't eat meat, the production of vegetables requires killing of animals and insects. When vegetables are bought at the store, that killing isn't visible and therefore usually doesn't get considered in our decisions about what we ought to eat. But when you have a garden and rely on it for food, the competition for resources is in-your-face. You destroy habitat when you clear and till the ground, and you need to control animal and insect populations on your crops if you want them to grow to maturity. Some living things must die for us to live. That much is unavoidable.
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