Garden Update

 First I'll start with the good news:

This is the first "strawberries on a wall" pot to produce something.  According to the books I should have nipped off all flowers to cause the plant to grow stronger roots so we would get more strawberries next year, but I'm gardening with the "who knows if we'll even be alive next year" mindset so no plants in our yard are getting radically pruned for the sake of an uncertain future.

Here is the neighboring pot with plenty of fetal strawberries and flowers. And, so far at least, all evidence is that squirrels CANNOT GET AT THESE POTS! 

And for an added bonus, I saw this little thing growing on the ground as I was planting pond plants.  I forgot to take pictures of that task (it is ridiculously hot and sweaty today and even working in the shade was deeply unpleasant) but the idea there is that I cannot simply plant pond plants in the water as the goldfish will eat the roots and so kill the plants.  Goldfish are carp and carp are notoriously evil fish who are (a) ridiculously smart (people who love goldfish and koi swear the fish "talk" to them--I know of several such people) (b) perpetually ravenously hungry and (c) capable of digesting anything and everything--including other goldfish--including their own children!!!  And, of course, the more they eat, the bigger they get and so the more they need to eat.  It's a terrible, self-perpetuating cycle.  ANYWAY...the pond plants need to grow in pond-safe grow bags so the fish cannot get at them.  All this assumes I will get the pond lining holes property patched (thank you raccoons) and get the waterfall pump working (I dread finding out what is blocking the intake tube) and the pond level will get up to its proper level and the water will get much needed oxygenation and the pond will provide a safe place for underhoused amphibians.

And here is a TINY green bean bush in our front yard.  It really is tiny--only about 8" tall.  So far it has produced about a dozen (actually pretty good) beans but the promise was that the plant would climb up to 6-10' tall.  I have no hope of that happening.  

Ok and now the bad news:

Earlier today I was in the diningroom and looked out the window into the back yard and saw something brownish gray and fat toddling around inside one of the sweet potato grow bags.  At first I thought it was a cat using the thing as a catbox so I ran out but--worse!--it was a juvenile groundhog eating its way through ALL MY PLANTS.  All the tomatos that I started from seed are now stems only.

And here is what remains of one sweet potato bag.  They are all like this, with most of the leaves gone.  Of course, none of the other potato leaves had been touched as even a groundhog teens know they are poisonous. I went online to see what the solution was and, apparently, there really isn't one.  The only certain solution is building a smooth wall that is sunken 3' into the ground and is at least 6' tall--wire fencing doesn't work as they simply climb over.  And anything just on the ground is useless as they dig under.  Plan B is predator urine, which I am also not excited about using as the thought of our yard smelling like lion piss is too horrible to think about. And, anyway, I have a vague memory of trying to get rid of a raccoon gang with the same strategy 25-odd years ago and it was useless--they didn't care at all and the backyard smelled like a port-a-potty for years. The final, least severe, suggestion was to plant garlic all around the perimeter of every raised bed and grow bag as, apparently, groundhogs have very tender noses and they cannot stand the smell of garlic.  Unfortunately, in this part of the world, garlic has to be planted in late October. So that ship sailed.

Here is a photo of a young groundhog that I did not take as the second I got outside to get a good look at our resident groundhog, it took off like a shot, squealing like a stuck pig. (They sound like a very loud chipmunk being carried off by a hawk.) Adult groundhogs are the same color but much bigger and very much rounder and they sort of lollop along as they are too fat and their legs too short to run. 

Don't let their cuteness fool you because they can do untold damage and not just to gardens. We have a giant one who has lived underground near our house for years.  It has tunnels all along our basement walls (about 6' underground) which creates the perfect place for rainwater to gather which in turn encourages tree roots to grow, which then prompts those roots to dig through our basement walls which then requires $25,000 of "water and mold remediation" work.