A baby woodchuck

We've had our eyes on the brush pile in the way back of the yard this spring (home of a large woodchuck), but so far the garden has been spared from woodchuck foraging, probably because of the tender young grass shoots everywhere.

Returning home after a weekend away, my first inclination is to make the rounds to check on plants (does anything need watering, how are the transplants I shoved in the hay bales just before leaving doing, etc.). All looked good, and I was harvesting snow peas in the satellite garden, when I looked behind me.

On the bed closest to the shrub border, hunkered down among the eggplants was an small baby woodchuck being perfectly still. Surprised by its stillness and small size (it was about a third as large as an adult), it took me a moment or two to move towards it. Then, of course, it scuttled off towards Mom (I suppose) and their burrow in the brush pile. The youngster's tail was nothing like an adult's, being a spiky sparse brush-like thing.

Checking more closely, I realized that preferential woodchuck foraging over the weekend had resulted in the consumption of all of the carrot and kohlrabi tops in one satellite garden bed, and all of the cilantro in another. It's a good thing I have lots to spare, and the onions, garlic, potatoes, and tomatoes aren't particularly attractive. All of my young bean and squash plants are about 4 inches high now, and I do hope that fresh grasses and clovers are tastier!

Needless to say, the Havahart trap will be set again tomorrow morning, although I'm beginning to think some sort of garden fencing may be in my future plans.... or maybe I just keep sowing cilantro in succession all summer as a border -- clearly they love it!

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Groundhog habitat

My gardening companion reported that he saw woodchuck holes galore along the railroad tracks behind our eye doctor's office this afternoon. The kudzu is leafless, so the burrows are visible. He said it reminded him of Matera (and the cave dwellings) in southern Italy.

Hmm, I'm sure that they're not that prominent, but I'll have to go look! He thinks they like the young kudzu shoots as they leaf out later in the spring. We'll see.

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A fat and happy herbivore

I'd noticed the tromboncino squash leaves disappearing, but because the vines were so robust and sprawling (and we could hardly eat all the squash, anyway), I assumed that deer had jumped the fence beneath the powerline corridor.

But, my gardening companion reports that it's actually a rather large woodchuck (aargh!) that scuttled back into a burrow beneath the brush pile.

Hmm, it's back to Chuckster bait, woodchuck lure, and a large Havahart trap after I get home.

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Musings about vegetables

Before I started growing them myself, I used to think that onions and potatoes were about the same home-grown vs. buying them. Boy, was I wrong. Fresh onions and potatoes are nothing like their stored versions, fresh being deliciously succulent (full of water in their cells, I guess) vs being cured (or dried out). I harvested the last potato bed this afternoon, but plan on replanting the smallest potatoes as 'seeds' for potentially a fall harvest. I tried a fall planting last year, and had a nice (small) harvest.

Fresh-picked squash are another revelation; the eight-ball squash, green scalloped squash, and yellow squash that I harvested (and we ate) for dinner this evening, cooked with fresh garlic and onions, are hard to beat -- not a bit of toughness in the skins.

Something called 'mixed summer squash' that I sowed in early June is now started to produce fruit. I think they were Curcurbita moschata, normally grown as winter squash, but hopefully delicious as young fruits.

Rotations are so important, and I need to step up my record-keeping in addition to my 'online notes'. At the botanical garden, a couple of our raised beds in the Food for Thought are showing signs of lack of rotation and planting diversity -- squash bugs, wilt in some tomatoes (perhaps not resistant varieties), etc. And, there was another woodchuck boldly running up past the Ethnobotany Garden this morning. This, after relocating three of them already!

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A woodchuck relocated

I'd been keeping the Havahart trap closed at night, not to nab unsuspecting racoons, opposums, or skunks. But after lunch today, and after a rainy morning, I put the door up, and thought I'd refresh the spinach later on.

But when I got home, my gardening companion was heading to the backyard with his camera to take a picture of what turned out to be an attractive young woodchuck, enticed by wilting spinach and Chuckster bait. Not the giant herbivore of my dreams (bad), but a cute herbivore that just needs something to eat. But not in my vegetable garden.

Between last year's drought (awful) and the woodchuck(s) eating everything green and watered, last year was not my most productive vegetable gardening season. So I'm not anxious to repeat the experience.

My gardening companion had happily volunteered to be the relocation expert; we determined that the grassy edge near a nearby lake, and adjoining golf course, would be an excellent habitat for this young woodchuck. S/he scampered out of the trap towards the building, but hopefully turned around for greener pastures.

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A cold blast of air and garden observations

There hasn't been any rain today so far, but the cold front continued to push through. The high was in the upper 40's (° F) - chilly for us at the end of March. Not only our native woodland wildflowers are in flower, but leaves are expanding on most of our native hardwood tree species as well as native shrubs. A favorite native vine, coral honeysuckle, is 'waiting' for the first hummingbirds in our yard.

The hummingbird website posts indicate that sightings have been all around us, but in spite of our feeders being up, we haven't seen any yet. Hopefully, sometime soon!

The potato sprouts are finally making an appearance in the satellite garden. The squirrels have been disturbing the beds by digging holes, but the potatoes are fine.

The radicchio, much appreciated by squirrels and woodchucks last fall, has produced lovely new spring leaves. I've harvested a number of them already.

But I'm on the trail of nabbing my primary vegetable garden herbivore, an errant woodchuck, who unfortunately thinks our natural garden isn't a bad home, even though it really isn't normal woodchuck habitat, or maybe s/he has just been pushed out of good habitat, without natural predators to keep population numbers in check. I'm not sure how to consider the wildlife habitat issues in this regard -- I AM a wildlife gardener, but if a hungry woodchuck (due to overpopulation) eats all of the veggies I'm growing, in sequence of preference (uh, I'm trying to grow my own local vegetables), well, I'm thinking I need to relocate the culprits to more fertile (!) pastures.

I've now got a large Havahart trap, baited with spinach dabbed with 'Chuckster' paste, with drops of some kind of woodchuck lure leading to the trap. The smaller trap, baited similarly, simply had the spinach disappear. We'll see!

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Spring peepers

Earlier this week, I heard spring peepers and American toads singing in the marshy areas adjacent to a lake nearby. This evening (very warm), the peepers were singing away in the retention pond next to the grocery where I frequently shop. Spring is coming on the calendar and is already here in the biological world around us.

The female carpenter bees are looking for sites to drill their larval holes, the chorus of garden birds now includes towhees, cardinals, brown thrashers, wrens, chickadees, and robins, AND the woodchuck(s), I think, have just emerged to have a very nice fresh salad meal on my young spinach plants. Hhrmph.

The squirrels have been digging everywhere, but Mocha (our now low-key, pampered Golden who shares our garden with us, as well as the wildlife) also is stepping on freshly dug beds, as well, much to my dismay). At least, he's not eating my normal spring crop of Tuscan and redbor kale, primarily because the woodchuck(s) ate them in the fall.

These are trying times for a committed wildlife gardener, but diversity is important, and we've pushed out so many species as our cities, suburbs, and rural areas have impinged on natural habitats, it's hard to be too cranky about those species that have been adaptable enough to living with humans that they've been thriving, in the absence of any natural predators.

What would 'consume' a woodchuck, after all, in a suburban food web? A fierce Jack Russell terrier is all that I can think of, followed by cars. The hopeful kids in my programs who think that there are still foxes, bear, wolves, and coyotes in our garden and neighborhoods are echoing the past, instead of current reality, with the possible exception of coyotes.

After I try the Chuckster bait, I may need to resort to attractive fencing, as so many other gardeners have done before me.

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Garlic, woodchucks, and fall flowers

I planted garlic yesterday in the satellite garden. I'm quite confident our trap-lining woodchuck (I think that s/he roams around the neighborhood looking for tasty tidbits) isn't interested in onions or garlic, at least the Welsh onions haven't been bothered. I can't say the same for newly planted collards, chard, or red cabbage, clearly favorites. Amazingly, s/he/they nibbled the perennial Italian dandelion in the main garden down to nubbins (actually a chicory) recently. Those leaves are so bitter that they require par-boiling prior to cooking to be edible. Worrisome, however, that s/he is now becoming brave enough to visit the main vegetable garden next to the house. I put Mocha out today on 'woodchuck' patrol. He'd much rather lounge around inside where it's cool, but I told him "Woodchucks, No." Ha! He slept on the shaded side porch all morning, so hardly was any deterrent.

Fall flowers are lovely -- the swamp sunflower is in its full glory in one of the perennial beds, and I've enjoyed this volunteer Blue Ageratum (Eupatorium coelestinum, now Conoclinum coelestinum) near the old metal wheelbarrow.

I also sowed more flats of fall and winter lettuce and some extremely hardy lettuce varieties called 'North Pole' and 'Arctic King' that have sailed through our last winters here without damage. Check out the Cook's Garden catalog for seed!

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Goldfinches in the garden

The bright yellow flash of male goldfinches this time of year alerts me to their presence. Lately, a pair of goldfinches has been eating Liatris,
Rudbeckia, and purple coneflower seeds in the front meadow. I wish I'd been able to get a picture of the male hanging on the spiky Liatris -- they're skittish enough that it's hard to sneak up on them.

The woodchuck(s) must be hungry. They're now starting to eat almost green tomatoes! Or maybe this is a hungry cardinal... woodchucks are most likely.

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Squash flowers and woodchucks

Aside from hoping for rain, it's a quiet time in the garden, except for gathering tomatoes and weeding. There'd been no sign of woodchucks in the satellite garden for awhile, so I hopefully transplanted a few of the trombocino squash seedlings that were growing in the main garden last weekend. It was an overcast day, so they looked good, and I had visions of the vines rambling over the mulch producing squash until fall, like last year. Ha! They were fine the next morning, but by late afternoon, THIS is what they looked like.

I checked out the developing squash on the large vine in the main garden, and felt better.

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Coffee grounds & woodchucks

I spread coffee grounds around the munched trombocino squash and violetta beans where the woodchucks have been partying recently.

Maybe the coffee smell will be a deterrent. It's a great soil amendent, in any case. Woodchucks seem to have very distinct foraging preferences -- curcurbits, tomatillos, kale, and beans are greatly preferred. Potatoes and tomatoes have barely been nibbled, except for a few flowers. The red mulberry was defoliated early, too -- another favorite.

What's surprising is that we've never had woodchucks in our garden before and our neighborhood is not particularly good habitat either. But we've spotted two out foraging, who scuttled back towards the brushpile. Hhrmph.

My natural gardening tendencies are challenged by herbivores like the woodchucks! At least they haven't been in the main vegetable garden, only the 'satellite' garden down the hill.

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