Protecting my food

 

Trying to save a few cherries, June 2023

Although I love my local wildlife (and they love my garden), I'm not quite willing to share everything with them.  I operate on a "don't ask don't tell" policy with bugs and slugs:  I don't actively try to kill them unless they are destroying in plain sight--such as cabbage caterpillars. 

Lovely lettuces, June 2023

The birds too are allowed a free rein with nearly everything in the garden--unless their idea of sharing means I don't get anything.  Obviously, the birds don't get the caterpillar treatment (ignomiously fed to my ducks), but I have to take a few precautions with particularly vulnerable plants.

Radish seedlings coming up--let's keep the pigeons off, June 2023

This year I'm protecting my lettuces and my direct-sown seed beds, mainly from pigeons.  Last year a pesky pigeon nipped off all my little swede seedlings as they came up, so this year I'm proactive.  The French beans were covered in mesh until they sprouted;  the radishes had the same mesh but graduated to plastic trays after sprouting (apparently pigeons particularly love brassicas), and the lettuces all have a bit of bird netting loosely draped over.

Apparently it's not too hard to protect against pigeons because they won't go anywhere they can't immediately fly to or from--and as they leap straight into the air to fly, this means they don't like to go anywhere with any sort of obstruction.  Thankfully my protective measures seem to be working.

And my little Stella tree is draped in some mesh and an old net curtain to save its 20 or 30 cherries (mainly from blackbirds although they are fair game for anything feathery out there).  As I mentioned previously, none of my three small cherry trees have produced much this year, and in a choice between a pittance of pie cherries or a pittance of sweet cherries:  I decided on the sweet.